Redistributing the means of vocal production: Voice training as a tool of political intervention

In this article, I explore the political and sociological potential of the practice of voice training, arguing that the training is an opportunity to redistribute vocal practices to groups of people for whom political voice is often denied. By drawing together Bourdieu's concept of 'habitus' with the practice of Patsy Rodenburg and Kristin Linklater, I discuss whether training is one means through which participants can identify the ways in which the social and cultural have 'marked' their voice and, furthermore, whether training can provide a strategy to counteract and resist these marks, particularly in the female voice. I examine these questions through my own practice; through a series of voice projects I undertook with groups of young women across the north of England, I explored the connection between engaging in voice training and the young women's own conception of their political voice.