Learning to Love Criticism

The article that I’m analyzing for my Rhetorical Analysis is “Learning to Love Criticism”, written by Tara Mohr. Her purpose in writing this article is to help women overcome their fear of being criticized, and to help them look past the words, and instead analyze if what people are saying about her really is true. Mohr goes about doing this not only through a connection to her female audience, but also through scientific evidence and offering advice on just how to overcome the spiteful words.

Tara Mohr starts out her article by talking about a scientific study done by Kieran Snyder, who analyzed feedback given to women in the workplace. Mohr shares the results of this study, as well as observations she’s seen in her area of work also. Because she starts out her article with not only evidence from an in depth study, but she also builds her credibility by sharing that she’s seen the same results working in her training courses for women. I thought it was a really great way to capture people’s attention, and get them to realize that this isn't just an Opinion Editorial, but something that’s been backed by proven sources.

Another way that Mohr effectively argues her point is through explaining, historically, why women are so fearful of negative criticism. She talks about how for centuries, women couldn't own property, basically having no way to ensure their financial needs. The only thing that they could do to protect their families was to be likable and accepted by people so that they were able to provide for those needs. She points out that while this is no longer the case, women still psychologically are stuck in this mindset. Through sharing this story, and just by her overall word choice in the article, she connects to her audience on a more personal level. By adding herself into the article, she is made out to be “one of us”, and those forges a connection between her intended audience and her, adding even more to her effectiveness in sharing her opinions.

Mohr also goes one step further in her connection, and offers advice to women on how to overcome the negative criticism. She gives multiple tips on how women can look past the negative words, and really analyze them to see if there is any hint of truth in them. She also tells us that we need to move on from the words, and realize that they don’t make us who we really are. I thought overall, through her evidence based arguments, to her connection with her audience, Mohr effectively conveys her point, and wrote not only an entertaining article, but one that gets her point across.