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Does your voice change with the language? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| rivere123 Senior Member United States Joined 4652 days ago 129 posts - 182 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 41 of 53 07 November 2011 at 2:58am | IP Logged | ||
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I got to say, I mumble a bit because I am not confident. But when speaking French, I do higher my voice, probably cause I think it's funny sub-consciously.
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| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5203 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 42 of 53 07 November 2011 at 3:07am | IP Logged | ||
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To all those who have said so far that their voice in one language or another is systematically higher or
lower, I have one question: Why? Why would a person speak a language with a higher tone than another when every language is spoken by a variety of people with different voices? Surely the average voice pitch of any human race can't be that different from the average for another race. It's probably inaudible. If a language actually were spoken with a higher voice than another, you'd have to compute mentally and instictively a very accurate average pitch for all these languages then determine exactly where you stand in one language and find where you should be in another. Either that or it's random and meaningless. I'm leaning for the latter. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 5947 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 43 of 53 07 November 2011 at 3:26am | IP Logged | ||
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This might sound a little nutty, but I wonder if Asians just sound more nasal because they have smaller noses. That larger Caucasian nostrils resonate richer and more varied harmonics, whereas smaller east Asian nostrils sound relatively tinny as lower frequencies are attenuated due to having to pass through smaller noses.
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| mrwarper Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Spain forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5048 days ago 1493 posts - 2500 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Russian, Japanese | Message 44 of 53 07 November 2011 at 3:39am | IP Logged | ||
Nonsense. Two of my Japanese friends have heads the size of small trucks (they're my friends and we speak like this all the time, please spare me the crap), with noses to scale, and they sound every bit as [non-]nasal as every other guy, yet no different from other Japanese; it's probably an impressionistic thing. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| IronFist Senior Member United States Joined 6259 days ago 663 posts - 941 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 45 of 53 07 November 2011 at 5:55am | IP Logged | ||
Adopted east Asians who grew up in America speak English without that nasally sound. That being said, there have been a few times I've heard someone speaking non-accented English and thought "that guy sounds Asian" based entirely on the tone of voice, and when I finally saw them, I was correct. It's not too unreasonable to think that there is some genetics involved. I think it's more common for black guys to have deeper voices than white guys. But that's based entirely on my non-scientific observations. Yes I know there are white guys with deep voices. I'm just saying on average, most of the deep-voiced dudes I've heard have been black. However once I was talking to a guy on the phone who I would've sworn was black (he spoke accent-free American English (not Ebonics), but he just sounded black). When I finally met him, he was white. I was surprised! Normally I'm pretty accurate. Edited by IronFist on 07 November 2011 at 5:56am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5203 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 46 of 53 07 November 2011 at 9:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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cathrynm, nasality doesn't have to do with the size of your nose, but whether or not you let air in through your nose. Otherwise, I'd agree that some racial groups tend to be smaller on average than others, so their vocal chords have to be smaller as well. But again, this is an average, and I have no idea how much averages can realistically differ.
However, each culture (culture, not language) has certain linguistic habits that become popular at certain times. Different cultural groups who speak the same language within the same city often have distinctive linguistic traits although they all speak the same language. It has nothing to do with genetics, but with sociolects. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5907 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 47 of 53 09 November 2011 at 4:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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That's right, It has nothing to do with the size of your head or your nose, nor your ethnicity. That's a really good thing, because for language learners, that means there's a lot you can do to achieve the sound that you want. Gary Oldman used a vocal coach to help him get that velvet voice in Dracula. I'm trying to do the same with Assiml, which is much cheaper^^
I think nasality can also be a trend -- a horrible trend. When I hear how nasally American women politicians and actrices sound I wonder what they're thinking. Do people think that's attractive? Does it win votes? I'm probably just not used to it. Moderators and spokespeople tend to pitch their voices deeper in France and Germany, I'm not sure how it is in other countries. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 5947 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 48 of 53 10 November 2011 at 3:36am | IP Logged | ||
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Obviously there are environmental causes, in Japan, I'd attribute a large amount of nasality also to hay fever. Enough pollen will completely block all passage of air through the nose. Nasality from American women who are on TV or in the public eye I assume is the result of failed plastic surgery meant to make themselves more camera friendly.
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