What Kind of Person Fakes Their Voice?

This article investigates the voice of Elizabeth Holmes, the ousted founder of Therannos. It turns out, she speaks in a deep baritone, that turns out to be fake. Former co-workers of Holmes told The Dropout, a new podcast about Theranos’s downfall, that Holmes occasionally “fell out of character” and exposed her real, higher voice — particularly after drinking. You can sometimes find YouTube videos in which Holmes can be heard using that real voice before catching herself and deepening it. The question here is, why would someone fake their own voice? Research shows that when men and women deliberately lower their voices, it's actually successful in sounding more dominant or in a position of power.

Posted by Sabine Cooper on March 12, 2019

Tags:
Masculinity;
Femininity;
Power;
Indexicality

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