Why do gay men talk the way they do
Why do some male lover men “sound” gay? After three years of research, linguistics professors Henry Rogers and Ron Smyth may be on the verge of answering that ask. After identifying phonetic characteristics that sound to make a man’s voice sound gay, their finest hunch is that some gay men may subconsciously adopt certain female speech patterns. They desire to know how men acquire this manner of speaking, and why – especially when culture so often stigmatizes those with gay-sounding voices.
Rogers and Smyth are also exploring the stereotypes that gay men sound effeminate and are recognized by the way they say. They asked people to listen to recordings of 25 men, 17 of them gay. In 62 per cent of the cases the listeners identified the sexual orientation of the speakers correctly. Perhaps fewer than half of gay men sound gay, says Rogers.
The straightest-sounding voice in the study was in fact a gay man, and the sixth gayest-sounding voice was a straight man.
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Have you ever read The Caucasian Chalk Circle? Don’t. It’s really boring. A leaden, joyless, ferociously unsubtle play about communism that I was forced to browse when I was 15. It’s low on laughs, to utter the least. But it was a part of my drama class, and I enjoyed acting, so I tried to receive on board with it. I read it in advance. And, as the class started, I asked the teacher if I could play one of the farmers in it.
There was a pause. I could observe an idea forming in her mind. Here – she consideration – here’s a teachable moment. She gathered the entire class into a circle, with me and her at its centre. And she demonstrated to the room why I could never play a farmer.
Farmers, she explained, walk in a certain way: shoulders forward, slouching posture, heavy stride (looking back, I wonder if she’d only ever seen farmers with club feet). Next, she did my step. Pelvis out, shoulders back, hips swishing from side to side. I believe she even threw in a limp wrist for good measure. Sadly, she concluded, the way I walked was too “poetic”, and I’d never make a convincing farmer. We all knew she meant: I have a gay walk.
Aside from the glaring question that this
Is there a ‘gay voice’? Why this student's controversial thesis went so viral
Is there such a thing as a "gay voice"? And if so, what constitutes it?
A linguistics scholar at the University of Oxford recently investigated this topic for her undergraduate thesis − and went viral in the process.
When Erin Broadhurst explained her thesis in a TikTok video interview on Oxford's campus, she became a viral sensation, getting over 8 million views, 1 million likes and thousands of comments from people curious about the controversial, and complicated, intersection of language, gender and sexuality.
Broadhurst says this intersection − an area of academia known as "lavender linguistics" − is one she's been passionate about for a while. It's also one that, she believes, warrants more research.
Given the massive response online to her thesis, it's transparent others feel similarly.
"As a bisexual girl myself, I was interested in the queer side of linguistics," Broadhurst says. "Whether we are correct or not, we do form impressions of people's sexuality from their voices. But what is it within their voices that we are thinking sounds 'gay'?"
'A tiny piece in a substantial puzzle'
Prior resea
Gay VOICE is a thing: You can tell a bloke is homosexual from the way they talk, say scientists
High pitched, extended vowels and incredibly articulated: so-called 'gay voice' is a actual phenomenon, researchers say.
Two science YouTubers own scoured studies behind the theory that homosexual men include a unique twang that transcends aspects like culture and upbringing.
Mitch Moffit, a biologist, and Greg Brown, a science teacher — who are both lgbtq+ — explored what exactly constitutes a 'gay voice' and what might lead to it.
In a clip uploaded to their channel, AsapSCIENCE, earlier this year the pair looked at study dating back to the early 90s.
They found that investigation comparing the pitch of straight and homosexual men's voices found key differences in how they speak.
High pitched, extended vowels and incredibly articulated, so-called 'gay voice' is a real phenomenon, researchers say. Stock image
Mr Moffit explained: 'Results uncover that gay men speak with higher pitch variation essence that their range from low to high is much more extreme than straight men.'
Mr Brown added: 'Gay men were also start to have longer vowel durations for "a", "i", and "u" — they hold t