23.3225, Diss: Phonetics/ Sociolinguistics: Zimman: 'Voices in Transition...'

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LINGUIST List: Vol-23-3225. Sun Jul 29 2012. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 23.3225, Diss: Phonetics/ Sociolinguistics: Zimman: 'Voices in Transition...'

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Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2012 20:36:04
From: Lal Zimman [zimman at colorado.edu]
Subject: Voices in Transition: Testosterone, Transmasculinity, and the Gendered Voice among Female-to-Male Transgender People

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Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder 
Program: Department of Linguistics 
Dissertation Status: Completed 
Degree Date: 2012 

Author: Lal Zimman

Dissertation Title: Voices in Transition: Testosterone, Transmasculinity, and
the Gendered Voice among Female-to-Male Transgender People 

Linguistic Field(s): Phonetics
                     Sociolinguistics


Dissertation Director(s):
Kira Hall

Dissertation Abstract:

This dissertation is based on a long-term ethnographic and 
sociophonetic study of 15 transgender people on the female-to-male 
(or transmasculine) identity spectrum. The focus of the study is the way 
these individuals' voices change during the first 1-2 years of 
masculinizing hormone therapy, which brings about a drop in vocal 
pitch along with other salient physiological changes. Based on regular 
recordings of participants during a one year period, the analysis tracks 
changes in fundamental frequency as well as formant frequencies and 
the acoustic characteristics of [s], each of which has a different place in 
biology-driven theories of gender and the voice. In addition to 
ostensibly hormonally driven changes to speakers' available 
fundamental frequency range, I present evidence that these speakers 
are engaged in various types of articulatory shifts as part of their 
gender role transition, which affect both formants and [s]. However, I 
argue that changes in all three of the phonetic domains examined here 
must be situated in both sociocultural and linguistic context, even 
where biology appears to play a significant role. The analyses 
presented, which include attention to both intra- and inter-speaker 
variation, draw on a multilayered understanding of gender derived from 
transgender people's own distinctions between gender assignment, 
gender role, gender identity, and gender presentation. My speakers' 
metalinguistic commentary on gender and the voice further elucidates 
the constellations of phonetic features that combine to create their 
cohesive gendered speaking styles. Ultimately, I focus on the ways that 
changes in one phonetic variable, like pitch, can recontextualize other 
elements of a speaker's linguistic style, like the acoustic spectrum of 
[s]. This connection drives home the necessity of considering the 
relationship between linguistic characteristics, rather than treating them 
as entirely separable variables. Attention to stylistic wholes, over 
individual variables, points us toward the notion that transmasculine 
individuals do not engage in across-the-board masculinization, but 
rather bring together acoustic characteristics acquired from disparate 
sources in order to construct phonetic styles that reflect their complex 
affiliations with manhood, maleness, and masculinity. 






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