Posted: Sat 05 Apr 2008 16:52 Post subject: Sounding White/Black
You understand how not all men sound the same and neither do all women. But most women sound different in a way that is distinct from men.
Not all white people sound the same, and neither do all black people. But most black people sound different from most white people in a way that is distinct
Esp, when you talk on the phone, and people take offense that I am able to tell their race, (When I say they sounded black/white)when they speak on the phone, even if they talk proper.I'm not even saying that every single black person sounds this way. But most black people have an identifiably black voice. Why is this?
Posted: Sat 05 Apr 2008 17:35 Post subject: Voices
The way our voice sounds is directly linked to our anatomy. For example, the thickness and length of our vocal cords in our larynx, the size of the larynx itself, etc. This explains the difference between your typical male vs. female voice. Also, think about how kids' voices change as they grow - the change being more prominent in males. It stands to reason that such anatomical traits are passed on, which probably explains that there's a certain pitch, depth, etc. that we might associate with a certain ethnic group or groups. In regard to such heredity, how many times have you encountered siblings or mother/daughter or father/son who sound almost identical?
I am also of the mind that nurture (environment) assists nature (genetics) in regard to voice. Now, like you, I am NOT talking about dialect or proper enunciation. I am referring to things like projection, usage of bass, etc.
The best example of what you are referring to, that I can personally think of, is Vin Diesel. The first movie I remember seeing him in was "Boiler Room" and I distinctly remember thinking, "Oh, a new Italian actor". Then, he opened his mouth and spoke and I was like, "Whaaaaat?" Immediately, my mixed radar was activated. For those of you that are unfamiliar with this concept, it is best likened to "spidey sense". Anywho, the moment passed and the movie proceeded. My "Aha!" moment came a couple of months later when my husband and I were in the checkout line of a grocery store and saw Vin Diesel on the cover of Jet. I picked it up and proclaimed to my husband, "I KNEW he was one of my people!"
I often wonder what my voice signals to people who cannot see me. I just asked my husband for a reference and he said I sound like Kirstie Alley, but not as husky, something like Alfre Woodard, and sometimes like Greta Garbo. So, I guess that still doesn't answer the ethnicity question of my voice. Perhaps the next time I call my cell phone provider or to make a doctor's appointment I should ask the person what ethnicity they think I am! Just kidding!
Posted: Sat 05 Apr 2008 19:15 Post subject: Re: Sounding White/Black
XxRaVeNxX wrote:
You understand how not all men sound the same and neither do all women. But most women sound different in a way that is distinct from men.
Not all white people sound the same, and neither do all black people. But most black people sound different from most white people in a way that is distinct
Esp, when you talk on the phone, and people take offense that I am able to tell their race, (When I say they sounded black/white)when they speak on the phone, even if they talk proper.I'm not even saying that every single black person sounds this way. But most black people have an identifiably black voice. Why is this?
That is more of an American thing. In the West Indies it is damn near impossible to tell the race of a person by telephone. You can tell however level of schooling and region the person comes from though.
btw: when I have my "office voice" it is a non-regional, non-racial voice. Almost no one can tell who I am (racially) or where I am from.
Americans of Non Hispanic West Indian descent though usually sound indistinguishable from Black Americans, atleast that has been my personal experience interacting with American born Haitians and Jamaicans in Florida and New York. Most likely because they have been very influenced by Black American speech/voice patterns since they usually live in close proximity to AAs.
It would be funny if Bliss Broyard ever made the cover of Jet magazine, I am sure your average everyday joe blow who is just browsing through a magazine stand somewhere at a Borders bookstore for example would think "what the hell is a White woman doing on the over of Jet".
Joined: 30 Mar 2005 {Posts: 1082 } Location: New Jersey
Posted: Sat 05 Apr 2008 23:38 Post subject:
Other wrote:
I am also of the mind that nurture (environment) assists nature (genetics) in regard to voice. Now, like you, I am NOT talking about dialect or proper enunciation. I am referring to things like projection, usage of bass, etc.
Many of the Jewish clients I deal with at the office have a "sing-songy" quality to their voices. I suppose this fits in with the above.
Americans of Non Hispanic West Indian descent though usually sound indistinguishable from Black Americans, atleast that has been my personal experience interacting with American born Haitians and Jamaicans in Florida and New York.
Most likely because they have been very influenced by Black American speech/voice patterns since they usually live in close proximity to AAs.
Children feel a need to blend in so many 1st generation Americans of west indian descent (especially those born of 2 west indian parents) usually can sound either straight out of the islands or straight out of whatever community they grew up in and normally can switch back and forth at will so that doesn't really count.
So, basically, from my research, its about your environment, not your genes for example, have a black kid, raised by a white family. He will talk like them, since that is his environment, it is not in his genes. 'Talking White' as one puts it; which is why many mixed kids 'talk white' or 'talk black', basically about who, raised them, or who they were around growing up..
There are Black people who grew up in predominantly White environments that still sound very Black when they speak. I have a Black neighbor who is originally from a small town in Kentucky called Owensboro where Blacks makeup only 6.90% of the population and Whites makeup a whopping 90.63% of the population. Yet there is nothing even remotely White sounding about her voice. If you didn't know what she looked like but talked to her on the phone you would still know right off the bat that you are talking to a Black woman.
Hmmm, now if this one case applies to all black people, which I can't believe, unless you can provide facts and state why it does?
The same way with accents; Take someone whom is not from a certain region, and then goes to a place that has an accent; Kentucky, Maine; whatever. They will start to pick it up, it has nothing to do with their genes, seems to be their environment
Where did I say it applies to all Black people ? Anyways just because an AA person grew up in a predominantly European American neighborhood/region it does not always automatically guarantee that person is gonna grow up sounding like Larry Elder or Bryant Gumbel for example.
Joined: 20 Oct 2006 {Posts: 283 } Location: Akron, Ohio
Posted: Mon 07 Apr 2008 04:21 Post subject:
Both XxRaVeNxX and Bischoff are talking about some type of an environment. However XxRaVeNxX is being more specific and Bischoff is speaking in a general sense.
In XxRaVeNxX's (specific) view it may be darn near impossible not to ''speak white'' if they are raised in a white family and maybe go to school in an all white area. So in my opinion hearing the white sound routinely from a very young age, gives no room to ''sound black.''
Bischoff seems to be saying that a general white environment should be enough to produce the white sound but can't. I think motivation to please is the answer to this one. Either the parents and brothers and sisters and so on will have the influence or maybe the kid will want to impress the white boys and girls, who knows. Yet I believe this general environment is not the same as what the child hears on a continuous basis in an all white situation from a very early age.
So, basically, from my research, its about your environment, not your genes for example, have a black kid, raised by a white family. He will talk like them, since that is his environment, it is not in his genes. 'Talking White' as one puts it; which is why many mixed kids 'talk white' or 'talk black', basically about who, raised them, or who they were around growing up..
Genetics and anatomy will still play a role. You can tone down your bass and talk more nasally, but you cannot alter the size of your larynx and vocal chords. This is the age old debate between nature and nurture. I am convinced that both play a role.
Last edited by OTHER on Mon 07 Apr 2008 17:31; edited 1 time in total
Allright, but I am having a hard time finding substantial evidence to back up this claim, that black people, have a different larynx and vocal chords. And automatically will have more bass than white people.
Allright, but I am having a hard time finding substantial evidence to back up this claim, that black people, have a different larynx and vocal chords. And automatically will have more bass than white people.
Vocal pitch depends on length of vocal chords, which is proportional to body height. East African cattle herders (Maasai, Tutsi) tend to be taller than the average H. sapiens. I doubt that this would apply, on average, to West Africans, but it would apply to inhabitants of the far north (Saami, Inuit, Nenet), who tend to be shorter than the average H. sapiens.
There are Black people who grew up in predominantly White environments that still sound very Black when they speak.
Television: BET, MTV, The Box (don't know who remembers that one) etc. I have heard people from LA sounding like New Yorkers because they have emulated what they heard on television.
Allright, but I am having a hard time finding substantial evidence to back up this claim, that black people, have a different larynx and vocal chords. And automatically will have more bass than white people.
I think I understand what you are looking for now. Here's what I've found.
Quote:
Fundamental Frequency Characteristics of Mexican-American Speakers of English and Spanish
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
Philadelphia, PA
November 18, 2004
Kenneth Tom, Ph.D.
California State University, Fullerton,
Department of Human Communication Studies
Introduction
Speaking fundamental frequency (F0) is directly related to vocal fold thickness, length, and elasticity. The possible effect of anatomical and physical differences on vocal characteristics of different racial/cultural groups has been discussed by Holland & DeJarnette (2002), citing Boshoff (1945). Although Boshoff (1945) found differences in the dimension and/or shape of laryngeal structures in Black South African vs. European cadavers, he presents no evidence of any differences in F0 characteristics of live counterparts of his study groups. It important to note that greater genetic and anatomic variability likely exists among persons with African origins, making the extrapolation of data from Black South Africans to all persons of color with African origins debatable, at best (Gould, 1996).
The majority of multicultural group studies on vocal characteristics have compared F0 characteristics in White American, African American, and in a few instances, Hispanic Americans, and found no significant differences (Adrianopoulos, Darrow, & Chen, 2001; Awan & Mueller, 1996; Hollien & Malcik, 1962; Hudson & Holbrook, 1981, 1982; Mayo & Grant, 1995; Morris, 1997; Sapienza, 1997; Walton & Orlikoff, 1994; Wheat & Hudson, 1988, Xue & Fucci, 2000; Xue & Mueller, 1996). Mayo, Watkins, & Richard (2001) compared the speaking F0 range in African American, Native American, and Caucasian women, and reported a significant difference between the ranges of African American (374.9 Hz) and Native American (284.8 Hz) female speakers in their sample.
In the U.S., Spanish is the most commonly language spoken in the home after English (12.5% of the U.S. population). 32.4% of California’s population speak Spanish in the home (U.S. Census, 2000). To date, there is little research on vocal function in adult speakers of Hispanic/Latino ethnicity, who speak Spanish and/or English. To provide adequate assessment and treatment of vocal function in this population, normative data for these speakers need to be evaluated and compared to existing normative data.
Copy and paste the following "address" into your browser to download the entire document. There are references that are even more relevant to our discussion.
Here is the abstract from one of the articles referenced in the above article.
Quote:
Speaking Fundamental Frequency Characteristics of White, African American, and Hispanic Kindergartners
Shaheen N. Awan 1
Peter B. Mueller 2
1 Bloomsburg University Bloomsburg, PA
2 Kent State University Kent, OH
Speech samples from groups of White, African American, and Hispanic kindergarten-age children were compared on measures of mean speaking fundamental frequency (F0), maximum and minimum speaking F0, pitch sigma, and speaking range (in semitones). Results indicate that there are significant differences between racial groups on measures of mean speaking F0 and speaking range. In particular, the Hispanic children were observed to have increased mean speaking F0s in comparison with the African American children and reduced speaking ranges as compared to both African American and White racial groups. Results indicate that the speech-language pathologist must exercise discretion when assessing the speaking F0 characteristics (particularly mean speaking F0 and speaking range) of children from different racial groups
A stratified random sample of 20 males and 20 females matched for physiologic factors and cultural-linguistic markers was examined to determine differences in formant frequencies during prolongation of three vowels: [a], [i], and [u]. The ethnic and gender breakdown included four sets of 5 male and 5 female subjects comprised of Caucasian and African American speakers of Standard American English, native Hindi Indian speakers, and native Mandarin Chinese speakers. Acoustic measures were analyzed using the Computerized Speech Lab (4300B) from which formant histories were extracted from a 200-ms sample of each vowel token to obtain first formant (F1), second formant (F2), and third formant (F3) frequencies. Significant group differences for the main effect of culture and race were found. For the main effect gender, sexual dimorphism in vowel formants was evidenced for all cultures and races across all three vowels. The acoustic differences found are attributed to cultural-linguistic factors.
Now according to this last one, it seems that voice differences might dissipate with age. Interesting.
Quote:
Effects of race and sex on acoustic features of voice analysis.
Xue SA, Fucci D.
School of Hearing and Speech Sciences, Ohio University, Athens 45701, USA. XUE@OHIO.EDU
This study sought to provide preliminary normative data for the vocal productions of 44 Euro-American and 40 African-American elderly speakers and to test the hypotheses that (1) Euro-American elderly speakers do not have significantly different acoustic parameters of voice from African-American elderly speakers, and (2) elderly male speakers (both Euro-American and African-American) do not have significantly different acoustic parameters of voice from elderly female speakers (both Euro-American and African-American). Voice samples from groups of 44 Euro-American (21 men and 23 women) and 40 African-American (20 men and 20 women) elderly speakers (ages 70 to 80 years) from northeastern Arkansas were compared on measures of 15 selected multidimensional voice profile (KAY Elemetrics) acoustic parameters. Analysis show that Euro-American elderly speakers did not differ significantly from African-American elderly speakers on the measurements of all the selected acoustic parameters of voice, and elderly male speakers as a group differed from elderly female speakers on the measurements of absolute jitter, soft phonation index, and standard deviation of the fundamental frequency as well as fundamental frequency in Hz. The findings suggest it may not be necessary to establish separate acoustic norms of voice for Euro-American and African-American elderly speakers. However, some acoustic parameters of voice are highly sex-dependent, and different norms may be needed for male and female speakers regardless of their racial origins.
The "spoken word" results from three components of voice production: voiced sound, resonance, and articulation.
* Voiced sound: The basic sound produced by vocal fold vibration is called "voiced sound." This is frequently described as a "buzzy" sound. Voiced sound for singing differs significantly from voiced sound for speech.
* Resonance: Voice sound is amplified and modified by the vocal tract resonators (the throat, mouth cavity, and nasal passages). The resonators produce a person's recognizable voice.
* Articulation: The vocal tract articulators (the tongue, soft palate, and lips) modify the voiced sound. The articulators produce recognizable words.
Voice Mechanism
Speaking and singing involve a voice mechanism that is composed of three subsystems. Each subsystem is composed of different parts of the body and has specific roles in voice production.
Three Voice Subsystems
Subsystem Voice Organs Role in Sound Production
Air pressure system
Diaphragm, chest muscles, ribs, abdominal muscles
Lungs
Provides and regulates air pressure to cause vocal folds to vibrate
Vibratory system
Voice box (larynx)
Vocal folds
Vocal folds vibrate, changing air pressure to sound waves producing "voiced sound," frequently described as a "buzzy sound"
Changes the "buzzy sound" into a person's recognizable voice
Key Function of the Voice Box
The key function of the voice box is to open and close the glottis (the space between the two vocal folds).
* Role in breathing: Open glottis
* Role in cough reflex: Close, then open glottis
* Role in swallowing: Close glottis
* Role in voice: Close glottis and adjust vocal fold tension (plus additional functions for singing)
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Immediately, my mixed radar was activated. For those of you that are unfamiliar with this concept, it is best likened to "spidey sense". 
Anywho, the moment passed and the movie proceeded. My "Aha!" moment came a couple of months later when my husband and I were in the checkout line of a grocery store and saw Vin Diesel on the cover of 
Just kidding!