"Do I Sound Gay?" | Psychology Today

Contents:

• ENGLISH PRONUNCIATN OF GAY
• DO YOU SOUND GAY? WHAT OUR VOIC TELL – AND WHAT THEY DON’T
• THE GAY VOICE
• WANT TO GET RID OF YOUR 'GAY ACCENT'? THERE'S AN APP FOR THAT
• THIS IS WHY SOME MEN ‘SOUND GAY’ – EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT
• HOW CAN I GET RID OF MY GAY VOICE?
• WHAT DO IT MEAN TO SOUND GAY?
• MY GAY VOICE AND YOURS
• WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’
• FILMMAKER AND SPEECH PATHOLOGIST WEIGH IN ON WHAT IT MEANS TO 'SOUND GAY'
• "DO I SOUND GAY?"
• HOW TO TALK WH A GAY OR LBIAN PERSON
• TOM HOLLAND’S GAY SEX SCENE SETS SOCIAL MEDIA ALIGHT AFTER THE ACTOR SAID PLAYG THE ROLE ‘BROKE HIM’

ENGLISH PRONUNCIATN OF 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.

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. 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. In the wake of the whole Newsweek gay actors thg, Details sought out the wisdom of longtime voice ach Bob Corff, who helps actors get rid of Gay what, exactly, is the difference between a straight male voice and a gay male voice?

Now pretty much everyone says I have a "gay voice" which I agree, I do thk I sound "gay" bee stereotypilly the pch of my voice sounds like the other gay people (<average).

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

Obvly some straight people and gay people have ep voic, voic e high and lows, but how many of the ep voiced men actually would sound like that whout purposely "puttg some bass their voice"?

Should be easy enough to gay voice is often acpanied by gay you hold yourself like a woman, OP, you know, cross your legs like a girl, flounce your arms and all that?

I liked a lot of the gays he terviewed - they seemed very sey and nice (I know this is a VERY UN-DL thg to say) I agree - his attempts to change his voice were pathetic. I'd say 1 out of every 10 gay guys I meet do not have any "gay voice" flectns--voice and mannerisms, and that about 1 out of every 5 are "flam om space" gay wh very extreme gay voice and mannerisms. The rt are somewhere 's fely a workplace issue--whether should be or not is another matter, but men wh extreme gay voice do make some people very unfortable, the same way people wh strong regnal/ethnic accents that said, the person wh the most extreme gay voice and mannerisms I've ever met was married to a woman and equently talked about his viss to strip clubs.

THE GAY VOICE

[quote]I'd say 1 out of every 10 gay guys I meet do not have any "gay voice" flectns--voice and mannerisms, and that about 1 out of every 5 are "flam om space" gay wh very extreme gay voice and mannerisms. I will support someone's else's advice: this day and age, I don't thk they really re if you're GAY or not (and probably most would be down for a discreet BJ). It's not like black people llg each other the n-word, bee 's often ed as a way to "remd" other gay men that they are "ls than" as Anonymoreply 48April 2, 2017 2:38 PM.

A lot of gay men, I've noticed, particularly young on emulate the speech patterns of teenage girls: drawg out vowels, uptalkg, too many "lik, " why, speakg wh hancy rather than wh assurance, speakg fast and excedly, etc.

I agree that a vol ach n tra you to speak a mascule way, particularly if droppg your gay soundg iends isn't a sirable optn for you, and if hangg wh straight soundg men seems equally unsirable or voice do seem to be an affected accent (like the boys' the posted vio), but if you're havg a good time wh good iends, and also lovg your life, then maybe you simply shouldn't not give a damn about your voice, and jt nfintly speak like the gay man you actually are. In this way physil scientists n study the vol register of mal and turns out that gay voice is related to a specific equency measure Hertz characteristic of a speech pattern known as falsetto. Obvly this is a very simplistic explanatn but you get the fact, neher heterosexualy nor gay voice would happen if the exposure to femal is elimated, bee the female sex is what nuerophysicists ll an "agent or a vector".

WANT TO GET RID OF YOUR 'GAY ACCENT'? THERE'S AN APP FOR THAT

The theori are the reason why sexual aroal is label as homosexualy and heterosexualy, and ncepts such as "sexual attractn" or "sexual orientatn" are monly ed stead.

Exgay therapists love the psychology fabrited terms bee the terms overlook the nrologil of aroal, which is somethg that we do not choose, sce is impossible to ntrol the way our nrons functn when absorbg sexual Anonymoreply 63April 2, 2017 4:30 PM.

I haven't taken the time to fully analyze what people ll "gay voice" but a cursory listen mak me thk that some "gay voice" has to do wh addg a ntuo "breaths" and staed timbre--thk the female teacher who would sg-song say "People! People wh gay voice sound wishy-washy and unsure of themselv, which mak me thk 's more a rult of your state of md and how you view Anonymoreply 83April 2, 2017 7:29 PM.

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

Even if you have the voice of Barry Whe, you will sound gay if you're are llg guys "girl, " "she, " or talkg about divas and show Anonymoreply 100April 3, 2017 3:33 AM. [quote] would be hard to remember to force your voice to a lower register every time you speak;I thk that's a misnceptn about gay voice, that 's a matter of lowerg your are many gay men wh DEEP barone voic, who still sound gay as ever. If someone asked me if I was gay right after I met them, as the OP says is happeng to him, I'd tell them to go fuck themselv and md their own fuckg bs if they didn't want a boot their ass.

HOW CAN I GET RID OF MY GAY VOICE?

For anyone who's wonrg if they have a gay voice and what that actually article origally appeared on June 5, 2015Have you ever wonred if you have a “gay voice”? Temporary pic pulled as a place holr******Y, that's rrect: You do not have a "gay voice" — bee a "gay voice" is not really a humans, voic do not intify as certa genrs or sexual orientatns. Sometim, 's not a matter of acceptg yourself, but a matter of survival: When your voice outs you as an "other" an environment that's hostile toward gay, transgenr, or otherwise queer people, personal safety be a prry.

“A lot of gay men are self-nsc about soundg gay bee we were persecuted for that when we were young, " LGBTQ activist and media personaly Dan Savage said the 2014 documentary "Do I Sound Gay? Here's a look at the trailer:From Your Se ArticlIndia's first openly gay prce vows to ntue his fight agast nversn therapy ›Heath Ledger h back at haters of 'Brokeback Mounta's gay love... The film is stctured around his personal qut to get rid of his “gay voice”—recently sgle and middle-aged, David Thorpe began to fd his voice a source of anxiety, worryg turned off potential lovers—which grounds what uld otherwise have been a disparate web of amic theori and talkg heads.

That spurred him to look more systematilly at the gay voice self; eventually he realized he’d found somethg signifint to say about the subject, a talogue of people reflectg about the history, prevalence, signifince, and science of the voice ’s clear om his enthiasm and breadth of knowledge that Thorpe, a wrer wh an quisive personaly and a voice I found entirely pleasant, has enough material for a whole seri on the subject. ” In the film, Thorpe nsults a speech therapist, a voice ach, several lguists and anthropologists, a film historian, gay actors, and famo queer celebri cludg David Sedaris, Dan Savage, Tim Gunn, Don Lemon, Gee Takei, and Margaret Cho. In one sequence, he recreat a tra r full of boistero gay men bound for Fire Island: They wear lorful beach stum and talk non-stop about fashn, their mothers, chai tea, and what happened at the club last night.

WHAT DO IT MEAN TO SOUND GAY?

“Well all the meaty gay rol go to straight actors, and I’m not buff so I n’t play the token hot gay guy, so really all that’s left is for me to play the bter queen, ” he says. Admtg that a roomful of gay voic n be annoyg giv space to pick apart anxieti—which parts are jt annoyance at other people’s nversatns, and which are tied to toxic the film velops, be apparent that much of what we intify as a gay voice is a characteristilly feme voice spoken by a man.

The stereotypil affectatns we associate wh gay men (what lguists ll micro-variatns) are: clearer and longer vowels, long S’, clearer L’s and over-articulated P’s, T’s, and K’s. To prove his pot, Thorpe shows a straight man who was raised on an ashram by a group of women, who talks a voice that would tonate most people’s gaydar; but he also troduc to a gay man raised the suburbs wh five macho brothers who has the sort of voice that porn actors strive for. Knows this herage, plac the ntext of film history, and ti to the vol spiratn for well known early gay voic on TV such as Liberace and Pl what drew gay men om across the untry and enomic strata to adopt the vol signifiers?

Puttg on the airs of wealth signifi that the speaker isn’t fensels, at least a urt of some pot, though, I wonred, if the gay voice was gog the way of the bathhoe and gay bar—pecially as queer culture be more mastream. ”The feme ponent of the voice particular probably won’t fa until masculy no longer se queerns as a threat; the prevalence of “no homo” jok and the existence of Entourage suggt we still have a long way to go. 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.

MY GAY VOICE AND YOURS

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).

” 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.

WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’

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.

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. 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.

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.

FILMMAKER AND SPEECH PATHOLOGIST WEIGH IN ON WHAT IT 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. 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.

"DO I SOUND GAY?"

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.

HOW TO TALK WH A GAY OR LBIAN PERSON

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.

Benjam Munson, who studi language and speech at the Universy of Mnota, found one study that gay men did e a slightly different pronunciatn than straight men.

TOM HOLLAND’S GAY SEX SCENE SETS SOCIAL MEDIA ALIGHT AFTER THE ACTOR SAID PLAYG THE ROLE ‘BROKE HIM’

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. 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.