I'm Jeron (rhymes with Erin). A trans girl, apparently. I dabble in basically everything. World Record Holder. Girl-King of cats. Fledgling Goddess of Hunger


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Weird question...hope it doesn't offend. I have wondered for decades why some guys have that "gay man accent"? Accents are usually geographical, not cultural. I'm not offended by it, but curious if you have any opinions or input? Live you much bug!

And I'm passing them on to you!

So what is the deal with the stereotypical gay man accent? Where did it come from? I've heard it used it in actual real life, so I know it's not complete fiction (even if fiction is where it's most common). My roommate even said she knew a dude who had to put in effort to not speak that way.


I should note that my mom is, like, bi and gender fluid, and not some completely ignorant cishet woman


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in reply to @jeroknite's post:

gay ppl travelling, you know much abt vagrant dialects? stuff picked up in small communities where people move around a ton looking for their ppl. gay ppl escape persecution to new areas > part of gay community in new area > gays in new area pick up a bit of their speech and they pick up a bit of the new gays' speech > gay people leave area escaping persecution, repeat

gender-correlated accents are also a thing so the hard line between gayboi voice and lesbo voice is just, gender-correlated accent stuff

Not a gay man but I am a transfemme and I'm pretty sure I had a bit of the "gay lisp" before I came out and my voice was deeper. I was always really self conscious about it because I liked women so I thought I was "straight" but after I realized I was trans I kinda leaned into it and now it sounds really natural as a lesbian lol.

This is a guess, but I'd say the answer is actually in the question:

"Accents are usually geographical, not cultural."

Accents aren't 'geographical' - where one is in the world doesn't (entirely) create and influence an accent (it has influence, sounds move differently in different environs, etc), but it's because, for most of history, people are surrounded by people! For a long time! And da's a culture, babeeyyyyyyyyyyyy~

As cultures got larger and mingled with others, became melting pots, and our ability to engage with other cultures grew via telecoms, it became clearer that culture isn't strictly geographical, but only partly.

When we can go to groups outside of our community, or find audio-bearing media that, more and more, exacerbates the accent as a trope, or go online and find distant culture, we might find parts of ourselves we desperately want to know, which can add a bit of oomph to the adoption of a mannerism - you like a thing, a person or people even, you act more like them - even unconsciously. It's noticeable even just in conversation - people can sometimes unknowingly match the stance and energy of a person they're talking to, usually if they have a really high opinion of that person, again, whether they know it or not.

So, it'd be my guess that it IS just cultural, at least, in terms of adopting the accent - it's just coming from Gay Culture. The thing I don't know is where it came from within gay culture, but I wouldn't be surprised if Britain had a hand in it.

sorry to just direct you to wikipedia but their "Gay male speech" page has an okay broad overview on the subject. you could also look into lavender linguistics more broadly if you're interested. like other commenters said, how you sound when you talk has to do with who you talk to, who you listen to, your self perception, and who you use as a model for how to talk.