If you listen to young women, about age 35 and below, you
will notice that they growl. They
also end every sentence and many phrases with an uplifting question tone. The two mannerisms combine to deliver a
distinctly female way of talking that is also demarcated by age. Whatever their
other sins, Sarah Palin and Elizabeth Warren do not growl.
You can hear this on the radio, especially news radio, and
most especially on public radio. I
do not know that this affectation is a cultural consequence of
progressivism. But that is where I
hear it because that is what I listen to on the radio. We have a Fox radio affiliate here in
Austin, KLBJ-AM/FM, but the only deejays I hear there are middle aged white
men. And I do believe that this
does cross ethnic lines: from certainly some to perhaps many young Black women who are
college educated also mimic this linguistic artifact.
I noticed this first perhaps five years ago. But thinking back, I suspect that this
began in California with the “Valley Girls” of the 1970s. I finally decided to log a few convenience
samplings for my citations. We have several non-profit radio stations here in
Austin, and our NPR affliate is KUT-FM.
KUT Kate McKee
“Why Don’t Austin
Community College Trustees Represent Specific Districts?”
(October 20, 2016)
KUT Audrey McGlinchy
(Audrey is from Brooklyn,
NY)
KUT Ashley Lopez
“What Mexico Can Teach
Texas About Birth Control”
http://kut.org/post/what-mexico-can-teach-texas-about-birth-control
NPR All Things Considered
Melissa Block
“Going for the Gold…”
(September 8, 2016)
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetorch/2016/09/08/493111873/after-going-for-gold-athletes-can-feel-the-post-olympic-blues
What is interesting here
is that the first two women that she interviews also growl.
NPR Rae Ellen Bichell
NPR Here and Now
Sarah Cliff
Perhaps the best offender I found right away is Alyssa
Rosenberg of the Washington Post. She was interviewed for
her series “IN POP CULTURE, THERE
ARE NO BAD POLICE SHOOTINGS: DRAGNETS, DIRTY HARRYS AND DYING
HARD: PART III” which was published on Wednesday,
October 26, 2016, and for which she was interviewed on NPR’s “All Things
Considered” Thursday, October 27, 2016, by Kelly McEvers. McEvers also growls,
but Rosenberg is deep into it. Here: http://www.npr.org/2016/10/27/499637421/washington-post-reporter-explores-how-pop-culture-influences-views-of-police
In this last example, the interviewer, McEvers, growls in a
more typical fashion, at the end of sentences or at the end of significant
clauses within sentences.
I could suggest several origins. For one thing, we all project tentative, unproven beliefs. “I
think, like, maybe, there is no God?, in the traditional sense?, but there
might be a Higher Power? out there on, like, a higher metaphysical? plane.” That just begs for growling and upward
tones. Valley Girls of the 1970s would
have been unsure about homework but certain about make-up and clothing, like ya
know what I mean?
Regardless of the etiology of this linguistic disease – if it
is that and not a mutation? with survival benefits?—it remains a cultural
artifact. I first learned of this
studying Japanese. (I had two
college classes in "Japanese for Business" before working for Kawasaki and Honda.) Japanese women speak in different tones
than Japanese men. They also have different words for the same things. I understand that this phenomenon of
gender differentiation in active language is not limited to the Japanese, only
that I learned of it while studying their language and culture.
ALSO ON NECESSARY FACTS
