Feminism at the Soldier Training Scene in Disney's Mulan (1998)

There are many Disney animated movies that can be examined using different criticism methods. In terms of analyzing feminist perspectives, I chose to analyze the animated film, Mulan (1998), by Disney. This blog post analyzes the film's cultural feminism, hegemony, and waves of feminism focusing at the soldier training scene in this film.

Mulan official poster (IMDb, 1998)

Sellnow (2010) states that cultural feminism focuses on promoting “socialized skills, activities, behaviors, and viewpoints” that are defined as feminine (p. 150). An example of cultural feminism is when Mulan's parents did not want her to join the forces to fight the Huns so she decided to report for military duty (Naudus, 2020). 

Third Wave Feminism does not only focus on women’s issues, but it spotlights the variety of standpoints including life experiences based on class, gender, ethnicity, and sexual identity (Sellnow, 2010). Mulan’s arrival at the training camp demonstrates the third wave feminism because the other male solders does not recognize Mulan as a woman and one of them calls Mulan names that are masculine. 

Third-wave feminism focuses on “issues of oppression” (Sellnow, 2010, p. 143). The video below from MentorEnglish Movies (2020) above shows the scenes including:

0:11 – 0:12: “Ahh, you ain’t worth my time. Chicken Boy” said to Mulan, however, the male character does not realize she is a woman.

0:43 – 0:52: When the big male character hits the multiple male characters like a domino and creating a huge mess on the scene. After Mulan shows up on the scene standing, all the male characters who fell got angry at Mulan even though she did not create the mess.

2:50 – 2:53: After Shang Li shows up to the scene, multiple male characters pointed Mulan and shouted “HE STARTED IT”

My name is Ping scene (MentorEnglish Movies, 2020)

After Mulan taking the blame from the soldiers, Li Shang showed up and talks to Mulan. Mulan started identifying herself as “Ping” when she talks to Shang for Mulan. When Mulan has her father’s uniform and calls herself Ping shows that she is countering hegemony in terms of gender because she tries to act the same behaviors as the male characters (Sellnow, 2010). 

Mulan "I'll Make A Man Out Of You" scene (Movie Clips, 2020)

Second-wave feminism focuses on the goals of “equal rights and opportunities” for both women and men (Sellnow, 2010, p. 142). The video above by Movie Clips (2020) shows Mulan is participating on the training camp but struggled, and then she started fulfilling the training tests to be powerful as the male characters. 

Overall, when female characters are portrayed in animated films it produces feminism perspectives. Disney's Mulan (1998) demonstrated the opposite by countering gender hegemony by Mulan becoming a warrior.

Question:

What other animated films similar to Mulan that a female character goes to training with male characters?

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References:

Bancroft, T. & Cook, B. (Directors). (1998). Mulan [Film] Walt Disney Pictures.

IMDb. (1998, June 19). Mulan. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120762/

MentorEnglish Movies. (2020, February 27). MULAN (1998) - MY NAME IS PING [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GueWwOaB_3I&list=PLdM9AMmdYsSvksXa-Km5RDaBgUuQeEFvG&index=14

Movie Clips. (2020, November 23). Mulan 1998 film I'll Make A Man Out Of You [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mYDAwAdsM0&list=PLdM9AMmdYsSvksXa-Km5RDaBgUuQeEFvG&index=19

Naudus, P. (2020, June 19). Disney’s Mulan (1998). The Legend of Hua Mulan: 1,500 Years of History. https://mulanbook.com/pages/post-imperial/disneys-mulan 

Sellnow, D. (2010). The Rhetorical Power of Popular Culture: Considering Mediated Texts. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.