Judgments of self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English: Which vowels do listeners rely on to form their sexual orientation judgments?

2021 ◽  
Vol 150 (4) ◽  
pp. A313-A313
Author(s):  
Erik C. Tracy
2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 206-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen L. Mann

Research on listener identification of sexual orientation (e.g., Gaudio 1994, Piccolo 2008) has produced conflicting results. I argue that one contributing factor to linguistic perception of sexual orientation is the speaker’s assumptions about gay male ways of speaking American English or about specific linguistic features that the speaker believes listeners will associate with “sounding gay” in American English. Interviews I conducted with eight gay men highlight the ways in which positive and negative attitudes become realized in discourse about sounding gay or gay male ways of speaking and its link to other social practices. I then present results from a language perception study, which suggest that negative attitudes toward sounding gay decrease the possibility that a speaker will use linguistic features associated with sounding gay and will, as a result, be less likely to be perceived as gay than gay men who hold positive attitudes toward sounding gay.


2021 ◽  
pp. 002383092110007
Author(s):  
Puyang Geng ◽  
Wentao Gu

This study investigated acoustic and perceptual characteristics of Mandarin speech produced by gay and heterosexual male speakers. Acoustic analysis of monosyllabic words showed significant differences between the two groups in voice fundamental frequency (F0), F1 of low vowel, and duration of aspiration/frication in consonants. The acoustic patterns on F0, formants, and center of gravity as well as spectral skewness of /s/ differed from those reported for Western languages like American English, which could be interpreted from a sociopsychological point of view based on different acceptability of gay identity in the two societies. The results of a perceptual experiment revealed significant but weak correlations between the acoustic parameters and the score of perceived gayness, which was significantly higher on gay speech than on heterosexual male speech. Although the observed F0 and F1 patterns in Mandarin gay speech were opposite to the stereotype of gayness, gay identity can still be identified to some extent from speech due to the existence of other acoustic cues such as a longer fricative duration, which is not a stereotype of gayness but has been consistently observed in Mandarin and Western languages.


Author(s):  
Ashley M. Frazier

Abstract School speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are increasingly likely to serve children of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) parents or GLBT students as cultural and societal changes create growth in the population and increased willingness to disclose sexual orientation. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) has a progressive nondiscrimination statement that includes sexual orientation as a protected status and strongly urges the membership to develop cultural competence as a matter of ethical service delivery. The purpose of this article is to describe cultural competence in relation to GLBT culture, discuss GLBT parent and student cultural issues as they are important in parent-school or student-school relations, and to provide suggestions for increasing sensitivity in these types of interactions. A list of resources is provided.


Author(s):  
Nicole Patton Terry

Abstract Determining how best to address young children's African American English use in formal literacy assessment and instruction is a challenge. Evidence is not yet available to discern which theory best accounts for the relation between AAE use and literacy skills or to delineate which dialect-informed educational practices are most effective for children in preschool and the primary grades. Nonetheless, consistent observations of an educationally significant relation between AAE use and various early literacy skills suggest that dialect variation should be considered in assessment and instruction practices involving children who are learning to read and write. The speech-language pathologist can play a critical role in instituting such practices in schools.


ASHA Leader ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 9-10
Author(s):  
James Lee
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