The Sound of Gender Change

When you think about the journey a transgender person makes what do you think about? Growing longer hair, cutting hair shorter, changes in the face, clothes? What about one of our most necessary human attributes – voice?

From a young age we know that girls and boys have different voices – different tones, inflections, pitches and even the way we express ourselves differs between sexes. A voice which is at odds with the presented gender not only impacts on a person’s identity but holds the potential to for awkwardness in social interaction.

To talk a little more about vocal alterations involved in sex changes we were joined by Dr Jenni Oates – a speech pathologist with over 30 years experience as a clinician and university teacher at La Trobe University.

Episodes