Gay men, ternalized homophobia, and (re)fg the "gay voice"
Contents:
- WHAT'S THE LK BETWEEN HOMOSEXUALY AND HAVG A 'GAY VOICE'
- THIS IS WHY SOME MEN ‘SOUND GAY’ – EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT
- WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’
- "DO I SOUND GAY?"
WHAT'S THE LK BETWEEN HOMOSEXUALY AND HAVG A 'GAY VOICE'
Self-nsc about the way he speaks, David Thorpe has explored why some people his muny ‘sound gay’ and others don’t a new documentary. * high voice gay *
Why are some gay men's voic high pched? Stay ahead of the trend fashn and beyond wh our ee weekly Liftyle Ed newsletterStay ahead of the trend fashn and beyond wh our ee weekly Liftyle Ed newsletter After a particularly bad break-up, David Thorpe, a journalist who’s his forti, cid to take his md off thgs by leavg his ts his Manhattan apartment and drowng his sorrows at a gay beach town on Fire Island. On the Friday-night tra journey he found himself surround by loud chatterg gay men.
THIS IS WHY SOME MEN ‘SOUND GAY’ – EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT
People wh stereotypilly high-pched or ‘mp’ voic n fd people assumg that they’re gay, acrdg to one Amerin film-maker - even if they aren’t. Likewise, men wh ep voic n fd themselv wrongly assumed to be beg straight. * high voice gay *
“I knew then that I had to get to the bottom of that feelg and to the importance of the voice as part of gay inty. ”It was the start of a four-year journey of self-disvery durg which Thorpe tried to figure out his so-lled “gay voice”: when did he start talkg that way, what ed , how exactly did sound, and, fally, what was so wrong wh anyway?
The rults n be seen his new documentary, Do I Sound Gay?, which featur terviews wh lguists, amics, fay and iends, as well as a number of high-profile personali, cludg David Sedaris and Dan Savage. A high-pched, lispg voice that go up at the end has been part of the gay male stereotype for years.
Another expert that he terviews for the film is a Canadian lguist who studi vol microvariatns between gay and straight men and speculat that many gay men more readily pick up speech s om women. Intertgly, a straight iend of Thorpe’s has what is nsired to be an archetypal “gay voice” and turns that out he was raised entirely by women at an ashram.
WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’
What the way we talk says about gay pri and lgerg prejudice * high voice gay *
A iend suggts that he was “advertisg” his homosexualy, havg kept a secret for so long.
"DO I SOUND GAY?"
* high voice gay *
When he was younger, Thorpe not, the only “gay voic” on televisn were those belongg to figur such as Liberace and Charl Nelson Reilly, the host of The Match Game. He also wonrs if Disney villas such as Aladd’s Jafar and The Ln Kg’s Sr, wh their soft, threateng voic, have ma young people associate soundg gay wh beg evil.