RANSVESTIA

helpful in the early stages of using the new way of speaking. But without sufficient neck resonance, the tone of the voice is thin and lacks body and the aim should be to graduate away from this device. (Complete elimination of neck resonance results in a falsetto-type tone, which is to be avoided, as it has an artificial sound.) Use of the nasal resonator also helps to lighten the voice, but is a minor element only. (It may still be valuable to American TVs, since common speech has more nasal tones than British speech.) The lips play an important part in lightening the voice, since through this opening most of the breath passes. The more open the lips can be in making a sound, the lighter will be the tone.

Intonation This is an all-important element in changing the voice, but needs graphic explanation which can hardly be given in a written article. It must be studied by listening to the type of speaker one wishes to imitate. In general, a man's speech tends to vary less in pitch than a woman's. Moreover, where a man em- ploys tonic stress to obtain emphasis, a woman uses kinetic stress. Tonic stress is increased volume either without change of pitch or with an abrupt change of pitch. Kinetic stress is a rise of pitch followed by a downward sliding of pitch and not necessarily ac- companied by any change of volume. When a child is being ad- dressed, and in certain other circumstances, the kinetic stress may be inverted (down, then sliding up). For example, in the sen- tence "where are you going?", the stress can be either on where or on going. Apart from the stress words, the notation of any sen- tence with a specific meaning will vary according to whether it is spoken by a man or a woman. In a complicated sentence, stress will probably be placed on different words according to the gen- der of the speaker. With a good ear, these differences will be easily identified, but many people will appreciate them instinctively.

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Tone A man's speech is, in general, more muscular and incisive than a woman's. It is also more explosive. A woman tends to enunciate more lightly and rapidly (twittering), but to linger more on final sounds, releasing final consonants more gently.

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