To: Professor Katie Powell

From: Josie Crawford

Date: January 4, 2024
Subject: Rhetorical Analysis Memo

Barbie | America Ferrera’s speech

Introduction: This
text is America Ferrera’s
speech in Barbie. Barbie is
a movie directed by Greta
Gerwig. The movie Barbie
was created in 2023 to
show women
empowerment while living
in today’s society where
there are new social norms
everyday, on top of that we
live in patriarchy without
even realizing it. In the
movie, the Barbie’s gain
back feminism while still
acknowledging male
hardships. Barbie realizes
she is living in a patriarchal
society and needs to be
perfect because of this.
There are many hardships Barbie—played by Margot Robbie— encounters throughout the
movie. This is when America Fererra who plays Gloria, serves this speech to Barbie. During this
specific speech she goes into detail about how society’s social norms have ruined women.
Ferrera goes into great detail as to how women can’t be too ‘this’ or too ‘that' because if they are,
they get judged, it ruins their self esteem, and essentially destroys a person. Society has this idea
of a “perfect woman” or for instance the whole reason the Barbie doll was created. The idea
behind this text is to persuade women that they don’t need people to like them, and that they
should be who they want to be regardless of others.

Analysis: The whole movie mostly appeals to pathos, it is a very emotional movie and there
were posts everyday about women going to see it and crying. Barbie’s target audience is younger
girls to young adult girls but the overall target audience was just women, in general. The director,
Greta Gerwig, appealed to women's emotions and how it feels everyday to be a woman in the
patriarchy society we live in today because the whole point of the movie and especially this
scene, is that women can do anything, be anything, look how they want, dress how they want,
and so on. You can also see all the other Barbie’s in the room start to listen and get emotional as
the speech continues, then this speech breaks them out of the trance they are all in. There was
also much logic behind the scene in the movie, it is factual that women are treated differently
today,along with the fact that it was credible. This scene in Barbie was so moving and emotional
that it touched everyone, not just women, which was the goal. Of course, the target audience was
women but reaching more people than that is an accomplishment, and this scene alone
accomplished just that. Had Barbie been written at any other time, it would have not made much
sense because it was a point to make it about today’s society.

● Pathos: This whole movie appealed a lot to pathos but this scene specifically used a
lot of emotion and seemed as if it were almost real. This scene made a lot of watchers
emotional because Margot Robbie is officially breaking down, crying about how she
can’t do it anymore and America Ferrera gives this empowering speech about how hard it
is to be a woman. This resonates with every woman watching the movie because most
women could give an instance where one of those scenarios listed in the speech affected
them in some way. The actress is almost in tears as she gives the speech and all of the
other women surrounding her are not only listening, but you can tell they feel the same
way as well. Imagine how many women felt the same way when watching this scene. It
pulls the heartstrings because it is relatable and many women, and people in general can
relate to Ferrera.

● Ethos: The credibility in this text is extreme. Firstly, there is America Ferrera, the one
giving the speech. Ferrera is a well-known actress who has also starred in Ugly Betty,
How To Train Your Dragon, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, along with many
other movies and TV shows. She has received an Emmy Award, Golden Globe Award,
and a Screen Actors Guild Award. The movie itself is nominated for an oscar as well as
Ferrera being nominated for Best Performing Actress at the Academy Awards for this
scene. Ferrera co-stars next to Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, who plays ‘Ken’ in the
movie Barbie, both of whom are very credible actors. This movie itself had many famous
actors but the two main actresses seen in this scene are Robbie and Ferrera.

● Logos: Ferrera uses logic when responding to Margot Robbie’s comment “I’m not
good enough, for anything.” This whole conversation is logical because when she is
naming off every situation, like for instance Ferrera says “it is literally impossible to be a
woman…you have to be thin but not too thin and you can never say you want to be thin,
you have to say you want to be healthy.” This is just one of the many examples of the
 hardships women deal with everyday and it’s factual, that’s the logic behind it. Every
woman can relate to at least one of the examples she names off in the speech. Every
woman has their own example of one of these situations, and that itself makes the speech
logical. It is a fact that women get treated differently based on looks, there are hundreds
of studies on it. This is how logic was used during this scene, they are all relatable
experiences.

Evaluation: The text was very effective considering the movie made almost $1.4 Billion
in the box office. It was only the second movie to hit the billions in 2023. Every social media site
was talking about it, it was the only thing anyone heard about for months, but this scene
especially was very effective. People talked about this scene everywhere and it impacted a lot of
women and people in general all around the world. The text was ethical along with the fact that it
appealed wholly to emotion and what it feels like being a woman in a patriarchal society.