Do you sound gay? What our voic tell – and what they don’t | David Shariatmadari | The Guardian

Contents:

• WHAT'S THE LK BETWEEN HOMOSEXUALY AND HAVG A 'GAY VOICE'
• THE GAY VOICE
• THIS IS WHY SOME MEN ‘SOUND GAY’ – EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT
• WHY DO PEOPLE THK THE "GAY VOICE" IS DONE ON PURPOSE?
• WHY DO (SOME) GAY MEN HAVE HIGHER VOIC?
• WHY IS THAT SOME GAY MEN EMPLOY AN EFFEMATE VOICE?
• IS THERE A “GAY VOICE”?
• WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’
• DO YOU SOUND GAY? WHAT OUR VOIC TELL – AND WHAT THEY DON’T
• MY GAY VOICE AND YOURS
• FILMMAKER AND SPEECH PATHOLOGIST WEIGH IN ON WHAT IT MEANS TO 'SOUND GAY'
• SPEECH ATIC FEATUR: A COMPARISON OF GAY MEN, HETEROSEXUAL MEN, AND HETEROSEXUAL WOMEN
• MY GAY VOICE

WHAT'S THE LK BETWEEN HOMOSEXUALY AND HAVG A 'GAY VOICE'

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. ”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.

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.

THE GAY VOICE

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. “Growg up, I was always told that what was wrong wh me was that I was gay, so ’s not hard to unrstand that a moment of vulnerabily I might also feel secure about my sexualy. After intifyg phoic characteristics that seem to make a man’s voice sound gay, their bt hunch is that some gay men may subnscly adopt certa female speech patterns.

THIS IS WHY SOME MEN ‘SOUND GAY’ – EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT

Rponse by poster: I wasnt talkg about the lisp, I was talkg about the mp by spooksie at 6:22 AM on September 23, 2005 I'd like to know how you know a majory of gay by trey at 6:23 AM on September 23, 2005 [1 favore] I believe 's a stereotype that most gay men speak wh any kd of voice. Those by LarryC at 7:17 AM on September 23, 2005 'Beyond Lispg -- Co Swchg and Gay Speech Styl' -- workg by ericb at 10:43 AM on September 23, 2005 There is a store here San Francis that sells "stant gay accent" chewg gum at affordable rat. This uld expla by johngoren at 1:58 PM on September 23, 2005 Can you also expla what "mp voice" means, and what ntext a "majory of gay men" are apparently speakg this language to each other?

It's hard to judge how you sound by listeng to yourself real time, but felt like the harr I tried to sound straight, the gayer I sound (Chip once claimed that general the harr you try to fly below people's gaydars, the easier is to spot you; I don't know why).

WHY DO PEOPLE THK THE "GAY VOICE" IS DONE ON PURPOSE?

They probably are naturally burly and mascule, a lot of gay guys are, and bee they aren't feelg the urge to prance around like fairi, they assume the guys who are prancg around like fairi are puttg on an act.

I know there's obvly straight guys who sound like that too as shown the vio above this, but on the other hand I've met sooooo many gay guys that do on purpose.

Even women might be so ed to men speakg "normally" that they fd hard to believe the gay voice isn't tentnally put on, sce 's so different and seems artificial pared to what they're ed to.

WHY DO (SOME) GAY MEN HAVE HIGHER VOIC?

Bee I was thkg - if the high voice is directly lked to them beg gay, surely 's pretty good proof that sexualy is not somethg that is 'chosen' (as some would have believe) and is actually somethg that we are born wh, somethg that is blogilly programmed to om the start.

Gay adolcents, Thorpe pots out, often learn that the “tell” of their sexualy is their voic, even more so than physily—a limp wrist is easier to straighten out than an flectn. It rais a plited discsn about gay pri, lgerg homophobia, disguised misogyny, and the extent to which we all alter the image that we prent to the the film begs, Thorpe is disturbed bee he realiz he don’t like his voice any more. He rri out thoughtful nversatns wh his iends and proment gay and lbian figur – cludg Gee Takei, David Sedaris, Dan Savage, Margaret Cho and Don Lemon – about what means to “sound gay.

But so dog, v everyone to thk about what their own voice says about who they are, where they me om, and where they want to science of “the gay voice”To start wh, the stereotypil “gay voice” isn’t necsarily a study published 2003, Ron Smyth, a lguist at the Universy of Toronto, found that participants readily separated rerdgs of 25 diverse voic to those who “sound gay” and those who “sound straight.

WHY IS THAT SOME GAY MEN EMPLOY AN EFFEMATE VOICE?

In Smyth's study, people rrectly gused a man’s sexualy about 60 percent of the time, only a ltle better than another small study at the Universy of Hawaii, both gay and straight listeners were equally as likely to misclassify people as gay or straight. In fact, the straight men wh so-lled gay voic weren't aware that people thought they sound gay at turns out that what most people perceive as a stereotypil "gay voice" is jt a male voice that sounds more stereotypilly feme -- maly, higher pched and more melod.

And that often has more to do wh the voic that a person intified wh as they grew up, rather than and other rearchers say some men, both gay and straight, velop more feme voic bee they are fluenced by women when they are young. If you've ever found yourself talkg to someone wh a different accent and gradually emulatg them, you're faiar wh the gay men, adoptg what's lled "mp" -- a theatril gay accent, like an old-school starlet -- n be a way of embracg their inty. “As a hly mted gay man, I learned how mpg up uld be liberatg, ” Thorpe says the there may be more subtle ways that sexualy and our sense of self fluence our voic.

IS THERE A “GAY VOICE”?

However, the difference wasn’t the stereotypil “gay voice, ” but a tenncy to e a more ntemporary, pan-Amerin accent, rather than the old-fashned Mnota accent (like  the movie “Fargo") says that the gay men he terviewed may have wanted to nvey an inty that is more stylish and cuttg edge. “As speakers of a language, we have lots of eedom how we pronounce sounds … People explo that variatn to create different social meangs, " he those who are proud n still feel stigma“Do I Sound Gay? ” shows that even men who are out and proud may still rry wh them some shame about havg a stereotypil “gay voice, ” even if those feelgs are Savage, a gay activist and thor, argu  the film that this is a natural nsequence of boys beg bullied for walkg and talkg a certa way when they are young.

WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’

As Thorpe pots out the film, there have long been public entertaers or artists wh stereotypilly “gay voic” – Liberace or Tman Capote, for example -- but few people openly talked about their when characters wh “gay” mannerisms or voic appeared popular culture, they were sometim d wh negative or sid the 1940s on, Amerin film saw the rise of a sni, supercil, and vaguely gay villa, startg wh the manipulative Clifton Webb the tective noir film “Lra. ” That tradn of the effete, aristocratic villa has lived example, film historian Richard Barrs argu  the film that many of the Disney villas have simperg voic or mannerisms that are subtly – or not so subtly – stereotypilly gay, cludg Prce John "Rob Hood, " Sr "The Ln Kg, " and many more, In an terview, Thorpe poted out what he viewed as one particularly egreg example – the bad guy the 2012 Disney animated film “Wreck-It Ralph. "We are pneers our time changg societal perceptn of what means to be gay, ” Gee Takei, who played Sulu "Star Trek, " says the homophobia still affects Hollywood.

DO YOU SOUND GAY? WHAT OUR VOIC TELL – AND WHAT THEY DON’T

Many actors work to make their voic sound mascule: In the film, Bob Corff, a Hollywood voice ach who Thorpe viss, says 20 to 50 people a year e to him to sound "ls gay.

And y, the stretchg out of “sibilant” nsonants such as s and z (image Kenh Williams sayg “She sells sea shells on the sea shore” and you’re sort of there) what about gay women? There are a few theori knockg around as to why this might be: Arnold Zwicky, his mply tled 1994 paper Two Lavenr Issu for Lguists, suggts that: “For many lbians, what is most important is intifitn wh the muny of women – while for many gay men, what is most important is distancg themselv om straight men. Third: this style of speakg isn’t simply an importatn of “feme” quali to male speech, although that appears to be what a lot of people, we’re still left wh the qutn of why a gay male voice might emerge.

MY GAY VOICE AND YOURS

When dis, a subversive dance movement that spoke to black people and women and gays, broke through, was vilified by mastream rock lovers for beg ksch and plastic.

For stance, a classmate om nservatory--who ed to tease me about my effemate mannerisms, BTW--was eventually st as a gay activist a big award-wng movie, based on a big award-wng play, about gay liv. Though some gay actors are effectively creatg their own opportuni to play a variety of rol (gay, straight, mascule, feme, and everythg between), such as the makers of the entertag seri East Sirs. But even though I chose not to ntue swimmg upstream toward a full time actg reer, I also somehow knew not to dismiss myself for beg “too gay” or too genr nonnformg.

I put together a short documentary about how actors--pecially men, whether they are gay or straight--are nsired by stg directors to have failed the send they “sound gay” (meang their voice do not nform to heteronormative stereotyp of masculy).

FILMMAKER AND SPEECH PATHOLOGIST WEIGH IN ON WHAT IT MEANS TO 'SOUND GAY'

” Thorpe asks everyone he knows--cludg queer celebri, like Savage, as well as iends, fay, and profsnal speech ach--where they thk “gay voice” om and how he n change his own.

Thorpe provis myriad hypothis for where this hatred riv om and asks to qutn why any one of (gay or straight) reflexively police genr nonnformy one another’s voic.

SPEECH ATIC FEATUR: A COMPARISON OF GAY MEN, HETEROSEXUAL MEN, AND HETEROSEXUAL WOMEN

As long as there is an unchecked cultural phobia of “gay voic, ” --by which we really jt mean effemate male voic--we are all nmned to a PTSD-like state of hypervigilance, too aaid to blur the l of genr, our voic or any other area of our liv.

MY GAY VOICE

Which brgs to the pot that our fear of soundg what we ll “gay” or “effemate” is not only about genr exprsn, but more signifintly about our cultural ias about weakns and power. By havg women, as well as men, leadg rol that exhib facets of power, weakns, toughns and vulnerabily, we n unrstand the human ndn beyond male or female, mascule or feme, gay or straight.

" In his new film, Do I Sound Gay?, Thorpe search for the orig of that stereotype and documents his own attempts to sound "ls gay" by workg wh speech pathologist San Sank. At the same time, I totally get that when I me out, I wanted to be regnized as gay; I wanted the world to know I was gay and I wanted to f to this existg muny, so I thk my voice really did change after I me out. On Thorpe's gay iends also stgglg to accept their voic Thorpe: One of the revelatns of makg this film was that this is somethg that had always bothered me and every time, basilly, I talk to a gay man I would fd out that he also had eher spent a lot of time thkg about his voice or ed to be self-nsc about his voice or still felt self-nsc about his voice.

It’s nothg personal, but I have known a uple guys who talked normal who me out as gay and then started to adopt this voice as if was “part of the culture” or societal ndng. I personally know a handful of gay men who do not have the “gay man voice” lisp thg (and they aren’t tryg to subdue ) so ’s obvly not geilly related to beg gay. Regardg atic featur of speech, rearchers have hypothized a femizatn of such characteristics homosexual men, but prev vtigatns have so far produced mixed rults.