# Do racial physical differences affect how voices sound, or is it all culture? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 4, 2008, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755 "2008-08-04T00:36:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![greatshakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/58956e/32.png) [@greatshakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/greatshakes)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/21 "2008-08-04T13:36:08Z")
[QUOTE=Colibri] Oh, please, give us a break. This is GQ. If you want to discuss this on an anecdotal level you should have posted it in IMHO. And what does Asian American, rather than simply Asian, have to do with it? [/QUOTE] I think that that was a request for an authoritative cite. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/22 "2008-08-04T13:53:49Z")
[QUOTE=astro] Do the somewhat different physical conformations between of skull, chest voice box affect how voices sound or is it all culture. [/QUOTE] Even after all the _sturm und drang_ this thread has generated, there is a GQ-level answer to the OP. No physical differences – it’s all culture. A quick-and-dirty analysis can be made by simply listening to folks of similar racial backgrounds who live in different English-speaking countries. For instance, folks of West African descent who live in North America and Great Britain will sound remarkably different from one another. Same for first-generation immigrants to either area from, say, India or China. That said, it’s often very easy to pick out aspects of someone’s cultural upbringing (not skin color or hair texture) from their speech. Where I live, there is a sizeable speech community in which everyone sounds what would be identified as “black”. The trick is that this speech community is about 40% Caucasian – sounding very much “black” over the telephone. ---
**Author:** ![Balthisar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/balthisar/32/2825_2.png) [@Balthisar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balthisar)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/23 "2008-08-04T15:21:47Z")
[QUOTE=bordelond] That said, it’s often very easy to pick out aspects of someone’s cultural upbringing (not skin color or hair texture) from their speech. Where I live, there is a sizeable speech community in which everyone sounds what would be identified as “black”. The trick is that this speech community is about 40% Caucasian – sounding very much “black” over the telephone. [/QUOTE] Culture upbringing and race are often hand-in-hand. I work with a lot of African-Americans, and there’s not a single individual that doesn’t sound black when he or she is talking. No, not even when mode switching into “standard” English. When accidently catching glimpes of daytime television, I sometimes hear white people speaking as if they were brought up culturally black. But despite their intonation and word choices, they still sound white. There’s a certain quality that’s missing. There’s still something that causes I change in the basic quality of the voice. I’m _not_ suggesting it’s racial, though. Now of course when I see black actors of foreign origin, there’s not a trace of “black” speech. With my eyes closed and everyone speaking received pronounciation, I have no basis at all to detect a person’s race or skin color. ---
**Author:** ![Jamaika\_a\_jamaikaiake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7993a0/32.png) [@Jamaika\_a\_jamaikaiake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jamaika_a_jamaikaiake)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/24 "2008-08-04T16:10:02Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] Don’t know the answer, but even if a black person speaks as clearly as possible on the phone, I can always tell they’re black, it’s just the tone of their voice or something. [/QUOTE] clearly? Just because **you** don’t understand AAE doesn’t make it “unclear” Anyway, I was listening to the radio on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, and I was waiting for Colin Powell’s famous speech. Some white guy was on talking about why we should invade, and about halfway through, it occured to me that _this white guy on the radio is Colin Powell_! And an anecdote does prove a negative to a universal, see [counterexample](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterexample) ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/25 "2008-08-04T16:45:47Z")
[QUOTE=Balthisar] Culture upbringing and race are often hand-in-hand. [/QUOTE] There is quite often correlation, that is true. > [@](#): > > I work with a lot of African-Americans, and there’s not a single individual that doesn’t sound black when he or she is talking. No, not even when mode switching into “standard” English. May well be. ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/26 "2008-08-04T16:48:54Z")
[QUOTE=bordelond] No physical differences – it’s all culture. [/quote] Not that I claim that you are wrong - actually I wouldn’t be surprised at all if you were right - but do you have any evidence for that? > [@](#): > > A quick-and-dirty analysis can be made by simply listening to folks of similar racial backgrounds who live in different English-speaking countries. For instance, folks of West African descent who live in North America and Great Britain will sound remarkably different from one another. Same for first-generation immigrants to either area from, say, India or China. Do you have any linguistic training? I ask because, sorry, this is pretty much a text book example of how it isn’t done. First, generally introspection is a rather useless linguistic tool. Second, I’m not sure what exactly this is supposed to prove. Nobody seriously denies that there is great diversity among black speakers, both on the level of individuals and cultures. None of that rules out that listeners are able to identify “black” (relative to some standard that has to be determined) speakers with statistically significant success. It’s absolutely possible that they aren’t but so far I haven’t seen any evidence. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/27 "2008-08-04T16:57:39Z")
[QUOTE=kellner] Not that I claim that you are wrong - actually I wouldn’t be surprised at all if you were right - but do you have any evidence for that? [/QUOTE] :shrug: What would the evidence be? What facts would we be collecting to make a determination? The way I’m looking at the OP’s question, it’s easier and more valuable to come up with the loads of counterexamples at our fingertips --living, breathing speakers – than it is to find data on “vocal cord length/nasal cavity volume/palate shape among world human phenotypical clades”. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/28 "2008-08-04T17:04:04Z")
[QUOTE=kellner] Second, I’m not sure what exactly this is supposed to prove. Nobody seriously denies that there is great diversity among black speakers, both on the level of individuals and cultures. None of that rules out that listeners are able to identify “black” (relative to some standard that has to be determined) speakers with statistically significant success. It’s absolutely possible that they aren’t but so far I haven’t seen any evidence. [/QUOTE] Yes, but identifying “black” on the phone isn’t the same as identifying someone’s race (read: social contruct of “race”) on the phone. I can identify “black” speakers on the phone as well – until Sade, Melanie Brown (aka Scary Spice), the French skater Surya Bonaly, Nelson Mandela, Condeleeza Rice, Tiger Woods, and Tony Gwynn all call me in succession. ---
**Author:** ![Sigmagirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c89c15/32.png) [@Sigmagirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmagirl)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/29 "2008-08-04T17:43:19Z")
I thought I could identify “black” on the phone, until I put an ad in the paper lo 20 years ago to sell a stereo, and the guy who wanted to come over and look at it certainly sounded black to me. When he showed up, he wasn’t. I was amazed. It wasn’t any kind of inflection or phrasing, it was the timbre. (And he bought the stereo!) ---
**Author:** ![liberty3701](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3d9bf3/32.png) [@liberty3701](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/liberty3701)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/30 "2008-08-04T17:58:19Z")
There are linguistic correlates between language and ethnicity. No one is denying that, I don’t think. The crux of the problem is whether those correlates are a matter of anatomy or culture. They are, without a doubt, cultural. Black people sound black because they learned how to speak from other African American people. We hear these features over the phone and can, quite reliably, tell if a person speaks \*like \*a black person. As the multitude of examples people have thrown out, there are plenty of African Americans who don’t sound black and vice versa. I suggest everyone take a look at the YouTube clip I linked to in post 14, just the first couple minutes. John Baugh sounds white to me. I’m having a trouble finding a cite to dispute the idea that it could be a matter of physiology because most sociolinguists take it for granted that it is not. I’ll check some books I have in my office, though. It’s also interesting, **kellner** , that you say linguistics isn’t done with introspection. The majority of linguists today use introspection almost exclusively for their work, particularly syntactians and semanticians. I am not one of those linguists, however. ---
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2008, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755/31 "2008-08-05T04:35:08Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] Don’t know the answer, but even if a black person speaks as clearly as possible on the phone, I can always tell they’re black, it’s just the tone of their voice or something. [/QUOTE] No, to be accurate, you can tell the ones you can tell, and the ones you can’t, you don’t notice. I’ve met distinctly black people who would never have been pegged on the phone. You haven’t? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-racial-physical-differences-affect-how-voices-sound-or-is-it-all-culture/458755.md?page=1)