Can Changing How You Sound Help You Find Your Voice?
Just having a feminine voice means you're probably not as capable at your job.
At least, studies suggest, that's what many people in the United States think. There's a gender bias in how Americans perceive feminine voices: as insecure, less competent and less trustworthy.
This can be a problem — especially for women jockeying for power in male-dominated fields, like law.
Monica Hanna, a tough litigator in New York City, is about 5 feet tall and has a high voice. She has always had misgivings about how she sounds, but things came to a head a few years ago, when one of the partners at her firm assessed a presentation she gave by telling her: "Your voice is very high."
"And then he didn't say anything else," says Hanna. "He didn't have any other comment to make about my presentation at all."
Many people would have been humiliated — or furious. But Hanna doesn't have that type of personality. She's action-oriented. So, when her high voice came up again in an evaluation about a year ago, she decided to try to change this thing about herself that most of us think of as unchangeable.
"I came back to my desk," Hanna says, "and I Googled 'problems with a very high voice' and 'how to change a high voice.' "
First she looked into surgery to lower her pitch. The likelihood of getting the change she wanted from something that extreme wasn't great, she learned, but there's more to sounding feminine than pitch alone. Speech patterns and intonation, it turns out, play a huge part, too.
Men often speak in more of monotone, with a percussive, staccato rhythm, explains Annette Masson, a voice coach at the University of Michigan who works with actors, singers and sometimes other professionals, like Hanna. Feminine speech patterns — more musical, with more pitch variation — reflect the different way women connect with other people, she says.
Women tend to be more collaborative communicators than men, Masson says. We say "we" more than we say "I." Even voice patterns that women are criticized for — like uptalk (going up in pitch at the end of every sentence? like you're asking a question?) — demonstrate a collaborative style of conversation.
According to Masson, uptalk asks the listener, "Are you still with me? Are you paying attention here?" It's a way to check in and keep the listener engaged.
But the pattern can come across as a request for permission to speak — evidence of insecurity. Hanna wanted and needed to command attention in the courtroom. To learn how, she decided to work with a speech-language pathologist, Christie Block.
Block is one of very few voice therapists who specialize in working with transgender people.
Some of Block's clients are transitioning to life as men; others are starting to live as women. But all of them share a common goal — they're trying to change deeply ingrained vocal patterns. Block helps each client find a voice that matches his or her physical appearance and personality.
To work with Hanna, Block borrowed some of the same techniques she uses to work with transgender men to help them have more presence and sound more assertive.
Hanna learned to open her throat, creating more oral resonance, to adopt what she now calls her "big voice." Block says she also taught Monica to use fewer words and be more direct.
Instead of asking, "Got a minute?" when she wants to talk to a colleague, she now declares, "One minute." She carefully enunciates, "Hello," instead of chirping, "Hi!" like she used to.
After months of practice, the difference between Hanna's "big voice" and her small one is subtle. But she says she is perceived differently now at work.
She likes feeling more confident, she says. "And also having the voice to carry that message across, and say, 'No, no, this is something you actually need to hear.' "
When Christie Block works with transgender women, on the other hand, the feminine speech patterns that Hanna worked so hard to undo are carefully taught, one by one.
First, the women learn to hit a target pitch — G, third octave. They hum at that pitch, then count at that pitch, and then try saying actual sentences, with rising and falling intonation, all hovering around that pitch.
Then they learn to stretch out their vowels, to slow down — discarding the quicker, more monotone, staccato speech many men use. The mechanics alone can take months to learn. The whole process usually takes years.
Tina White, a director of information management at Pfizer, worked with Christie Block a few years ago.
"It is a very intensive, introspective process to go through," says White. "On TV we like to talk about transwomen dressing up, changing their bodies, and everyone's all titillated by all those sexual parts. I think if you talk to transwomen, voice is psychologically far more important to their sense of acceptance than everything else that everyone else obsesses with."
That's because no matter how feminine you look physically, if a male-sounding voice comes out of your mouth, people will probably raise their eyebrows — or worse.
Transgender women are more likely than other LGBT people to be victims of violent hate crime. They're most vulnerable when they stand out, so finding a voice that matches their physical presentation, and helps them blend in, can be a matter of life and death.
"When being able to use a restroom, not being laughed at, at work, not getting beat up on the train on the way home, are dependent on your voice, you are terrified," says White.
Violence from the outside world isn't the only danger. Transgender women experience much higher rates of depression and suicide than the general population. White sees this in her own community. "I've known one [woman] in particular who has been hospitalized three times for trying to commit suicide, and voice is not a small part of that."
White did voice work for about nine months before she finally felt confident enough to try out her new voice at the office. But then came a new fear: that she wouldn't be taken as seriously as a woman.
"I think that I used to enjoy white male privilege," she says. "And so I could be kind of sloppy." Just standing in front of a room and talking back then was usually enough to feel listened to.
Now, White explains, "I find that I have to think a little bit more and be a little bit more prepared and precise."
So there can be some trade-offs to finding a voice that really expresses who you are — trade-offs that both Tina White and Monica Hanna are willing to put up with.
Hanna says that initially some people close to her didn't approve of the changes she was making in her voice; some called the changes anti-feminist. But for Hanna, the goal was not to work against her identity as a woman, but to find a way to make her voice less distracting.
"I want to be taken more seriously," she says, "from the first words out of my mouth to the last. I'm never going to be a baritone powerhouse. There's something to be said about doing something to improve yourself in a way that adds to your craft and adds to your credibility."
White, meanwhile, can now give voice to the internal — and very feminine — monologue that she spent her life censoring, certain she would be ridiculed.
"I'm finally happy," White says, "because [this voice] lets me express the feelings that I have inside, that I was always keeping bottled up."
That's the goal of all this hard work: for women like White and Hanna to find their voices, so the world can stop focusing on how they sound and pay attention to what they're saying.
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Transcript
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Audie Cornish. People can be hard on women's voices, especially in the workplace. Women can be told they sound shrill or lack authority, turning it into a distraction from their work. For our series on the Changing Lives of Women, NPR's Laura Starecheski introduces us to two women who changed their voices to fit in.
LAURA STARECHESKI, BYLINE: All the stereotypes you'd expect about how people respond to men's and women's voices are pretty much true. Research shows that gender bias is a real thing when it comes to voice. Women's voices, in study after study, are rated by listeners as less secure, less competent, less trustworthy. But if I told you the rest of the story like this are you going to trust me more? I doubt it. You'd probably take me even less seriously. And that's the problem a woman named Monica Hannah had.
MONICA HANNAH: One of the things that was holding me back really was my voice. It had always been sort of a screechy, high-pitched, quick talking - it's just how I talk, I think.
STARECHESKI: Monica is a litigator in New York City. She also happens to be about five feet tall and she looks and sounds so young she often gets mistaken for a teenager. A few years ago, she gave a presentation at her law firm. One of the partners gave her this assessment.
HANNAH: Your voice is very high. And I said oh, OK. And then he didn't say anything else. He didn't have any other comment to make about my presentation at all.
STARECHESKI: When her high voice came up again in an evaluation about a year ago, she decided to try to change this thing about herself that most of us think of as unchangeable.
HANNAH: I came back to my desk and I googled, you know, problems with a very high voice, how to change a high voice.
STARECHESKI: First, she looked into surgery. The prognosis for a real change in pitch wasn't great but there's more to sounding feminine than pitch alone. Your speech patterns are a huge part of it too. Women tend to speak more musically with more pitch variation, while men often speak in a more monotone, percussive, staccato rhythm - think Barack Obama for example. Monica needed to instantly command attention in the courtroom, the way her male colleagues did. To learn how, she decided to work with a voice therapist named Christie Block.
HANNAH: Normally, her work is with transgendered people. And, you know, that wouldn't be totally out of line with what I was looking to do since I was looking to, you know, bring out more of a masculine voice.
STARECHESKI: Block is one of very few voice therapists who specialize in working with transgender people. She helps them find a voice that will match their physical appearance.
CHRISTIE BLOCK: It's fabulous, rewarding work. I love it.
STARECHESKI: To work with Monica, Block borrowed some of the same techniques she uses to work with transgender men, to help them have more of a presence and sound more assertive.
BLOCK: So this is my regular voice. With trans-masculine people we kind of open the throat more, and I'm using the same pitch but I'm trying to create more space in my mouth and my throat. So now I have more open oral resonance and I sound bigger.
STARECHESKI: Monica learned to do this, to physically change the way she uses her throat muscles, to adopt what she now calls her big voice. Block says she also taught Monica to use fewer words and be more direct.
BLOCK: We talked about getting somebody's attention. Like, instead of saying got a minute? We would say one minute.
HANNAH: When people would give me news or something and I used to say aw or that's cute. And now I use my words (laughter). Like, oh, that's too bad or oh, that's really too nice to hear. I'm glad that that happened.
STARECHESKI: After months of work, here's Monica's old, small voice.
HANNAH: The tractor man got down from his cab. The other man, the one who was tying up the gates, came and joined the first man.
STARECHESKI: And here's her big voice.
HANNAH: The tractor man got down from his cab. The other man, the one who was tying up the gates...
STARECHESKI: The difference is subtle but Monica says she feels more confident now. And male colleagues don't talk over her as much anymore. When she speaks they pay attention. When Christie Block works with transgender women, the feminine speech patterns that Monica worked so hard to undo are identified and taught one by one.
BLOCK: We're fighting against years and years and years and years of dude voice, right?
(LAUGHTER)
BLOCK: That we're trying to get away from.
STARECHESKI: I sat in on a voice workshop with about a dozen transwomen in downtown Manhattan one Thursday night. First, the women learned to hit a target pitch - G third octave.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Singing) Mi.
BLOCK: Very good. Fun? Easy?
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: Yes.
BLOCK: You're all getting better at it already.
STARECHESKI: They learn to stretch out their vowels, to create hills and valleys in their intonation.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: They have great coffee.
BLOCK: Good. So now, really stretch it out.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN AND BLOCK: They have great coffee.
BLOCK: (Laughter) Very good.
STARECHESKI: Tina White is a director at the drug company Pfizer. She worked with Christie Block a few years ago. She says her old voice was gentle but much deeper than the way she sounds now.
TINA WHITE: It is a very intensive, introspective process to go through. On TV, we like to talk about transwomen dressing up and changing their bodies and everyone's all titillated by all those, kind of, sexual parts. I think if you talk to transwomen, voice is psychologically far more important to their sense of acceptance than everything else that everyone else obsesses with.
STARECHESKI: Transgender women are more likely than other LGBT people to be victims of violent hate crimes. They're most vulnerable when they stand out. So finding a voice that matches your appearance and helps you blend in can be a matter of life and death.
WHITE: When being able to go to use a restroom, not being laughed at at work, not getting beat up on the train on the way home, are dependent on your voice, you are terrified.
STARECHESKI: Tina did voice work for about nine months before she finally felt confident enough to try out her new voice at the office. But then, there was a new fear - that she wouldn't be taken as seriously as a woman.
WHITE: I think that I used to enjoy white male privilege. And so I could be kind of sloppy.
STARECHESKI: Just standing in front of a room and talking was usually enough to feel listened to.
WHITE: I find that I have to think a little bit more and be a little bit more prepared and precise.
STARECHESKI: So there are some trade-offs to finding a voice that really expresses who you are - something both Tina and Monica, the litigator, are willing to put up with.
WHITE: I'm finally happy because it lets me express the feelings that I have inside that I was always keeping bottled up.
HANNAH: It was just a combination of being more confident in my own role and also having, you know, the voice to carry that message across and say no no, this is actually something you really need to hear.
STARECHESKI: That message is finally getting through. And that's the goal of all this hard work - for people to stop focusing on how women, like Monica and Tina, sound and pay attention to what they're saying. Laura Starecheski, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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