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Erin Slason
Heather Peterson
1 December 2017
Are women heard when publicly speaking? Historically, women have not been allowed
space to speak in public, and this continues to be true today. In Mary Beards 2014 article,
published in London Review Books, The Public Voice of Women, Beard expresses that women
have been looked down on by men ever since Ancient Greece and Rome. Beard studied the
reception of womens speech in public throughout Western history until now is the same. Beard
studied at the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England and throughout her career in
college, she went to an all-girl school, but she came across men who believed woman did not
have much say and do not deserve an education and met many feminists. Francesca Polletta, the
2013 author of Gender and Public Talk: Accounting for Womens Variable Participation in the
California, Irvine. She explains how men and women should have equal roles in society but do
not. Men have always been higher up in the hierarchy than women, and explains the harm of
gender shaming and what it is doing to our society. And finally, Judith Baxter the 2006 author of
Speaking Out: The Female Voice in Public Contexts is a British sociologist and a professor of
Applied Linguistics at Aston University where she specializes in Gender and Language, and
Leadership Language. Throughout the novel, Baxter talks about how womens voices are
considered third wave language. Womens voices are silenced when it comes to men being
their audiences, and that women have only been married to their husbands to be their objects.
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Women are given less opportunities in public speaking because of their genders and their roles in
society.
Ever since ancient times, a womans right to do anything was nonexistent, especially
when it comes to public speaking. Even since ancient times women have not been heard. Beard
mentions, I want to start very near the beginning of the tradition of Western literature, and its
first recorded example of a man telling a woman to shut up; telling her that her voice was not to
be heard in public (Beard, 2014). It is not a new problem with society, it has been an issue since
Ancient times. Beard explains telemachus outburst was just the first example in a long line of
largely successful attempts stretching throughout Greek and Roman antiquity, not only to
exclude women from public speech but also to parade that exclusion (Beard, 2014). Even in
Ancient Greece and Rome, women had no right in public speaking and that is how it is now. In
order for a woman to even be considered noticed, they pay large amounts of money. Beard
stated, but if we want to understand and do something about the fact that women, even when
they are not silenced, still have to pay a very high price for being heard, we have Women are not
heard no matter how much they try. Not only does society treat women terribly when it comes to
public speaking, but when it comes to everyday things, they get mistreated. Beard also mentions,
women are allowed to speak out as victims and as martyrs usually to preface their own death
(Beard, 2014). Women are only allowed to speak publicly if it is affecting them. They also have
the right to speak when there is a reason to speak. Beard mentions, occasionally women could
legitimately rise up to speak to defend their homes, their children, their husbands or the
interests of other women (Beard, 2014). The only time it is socially acceptable to publicly speak
Francesca Polletta, the 2013 author of Gender and Public Talk: Accounting for
Womens Variable Participation in the Public Sphere talks about how women are publicly
shamed because of their genders and their roles in society. Polletta includes, by default, most
sites of public political talk are masculine. However, some of the discourses that are used to talk
about public life are anchored in feminized institutions such as social work and psychotherapy
(Polletta 292). In order for a woman to speak in any social place, they have to either be high up
in the hierarchy or work in a field that requires them to speak. Society categorizes public
speaking with masculinity because it is easier for them to be heard. Polletta includes, studies
show, variously, that men speak (or write) more often, speak for longer turns, interrupt more, are
more hostile in tone, are more likely to be responded to, are more likely to be responded to
respectfully, and are more likely to respond to women in a challenging way (Polletta 294). Men
have that competitive trait that gives them more power when it comes to speaking or writing. It is
easier for men to be heard because of their tone of voice and how they come about speaking. Not
only are women discouraged when it comes to public speaking, but in general they are treated
less human because of their gender. Polletta includes, we draw accordingly on research that has
occupations gender composition. But the consequences we are interested in are not equal in pay
or mobility, but rather equality in talk. Accordingly, we emphasize the importance not only of
the gender composition of the occupations sponsoring and organizing public talk, but also of the
gendered norms of talk that are promoted (Polletta 295). Women should not have to fight to be
Judith Baxter the 2006 author of Speaking Out: The Female Voice in Public Contexts,
she talks about how to this day womens voices are silenced when it comes to men. Baxter
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mentions, although the problematic status of womens public speech is not exclusively a
modern or western phenomenon, the phrase the female voice in public contexts has a specific
meaning in the context of western modernity, where the binary oppositions male/female and
public/private are both salient principles of social organization (Baxter 4). Though the
male/female voice is important, womens voices are considered less important because of the
way their voices sound and the way they present their voice. Baxter includes, speakers make
use of this paradigm to construct the female voice as irrational and authoritative, thus
undermining a female speaker and her message (Baxter 3). Because a womans voice comes off
annoying, people do not want to listen to them speak. Finally, Baxter also includes, Jones
points out that this injunction to women to be silent marked a shift in mainstream ideals of
gender, championed first by middle-class puritans in opposition to what they regarded as the
decadence of the aristocracy (Baxter 5). Womens voices have been ignored ever since Western
Womens roles in society are still the same as they were in Ancient Greece and Rome. In
order for a woman to publicly speak, they have to try hard to be heard. Beard states that women's
roles in society are looked passed because of their gender. What a woman says means nothing
because it is coming from a female and a female voice is blocked out automatically. Beard
mentions, but its a nice demonstration that right where written evidence for Western culture
starts, womens voices are not being heard in the public sphere; more than that, as Homer has it,
an integral part of growing up, as a man, is learning to take control of public utterance and to
silence the female of the species (Beard, 2014). Not only were women silenced in the public
sphere, but even being in a household, the women were still silenced and men acted like the
women were not there. People do not respect a woman when they are speaking and they are
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looked down on because of past times. Men were raised to take control and to speak for women
Women have not been allowed space to speak in public, and it continues today. Women
have to try very hard to be heard just a little and that is not how society should work. Just
because a womens voice is different from mens voices, does not give society the right to
disregard what women are saying and how they come about speaking in public. We have
freedom of speech and women should be allowed to speak what is on their minds. It matters for
womens voices to be heard because what they have to say can be relevant to what is going on in
todays society. People did not fight for our freedom, just for womens rights to be shot down.
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Works Citied
Baxter, Judith. Speaking out: the female voice in public contexts. Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.
Beard, Mary. "The Public Voice of Women." London Review of Books (2014): 11-14-17
Nov. 2017
Publishers, Inc.