#GAReads | Womens' voices are judged more harshly than men's
photo credit: Clem Onojeghuo, via Unsplash
“Women’s voices are judged more harshly than men’s”:
The complaint goes like this: since uptalk uses the intonation of a question for a statement, it makes the statement sound uncertain, and its speaker weak. Additionally, since higher voices are characteristic of children, using uptalk seems like a voluntary abdication of authority. And vocal fry, for its part, is criticised as a put-on sexy, fake-femme-fatale affectation. The rise of both is said to constitute an epidemic of “sexy baby voice”.