Re-sounding Trump's Voice (My Precious)
2020; Volume: 59; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/cj.2020.0046
ISSN2578-4919
Autores Tópico(s)Media, Communication, and Education
ResumoRe-sounding Trump's Voice (My Precious) Jaimie Baron (bio) It is a particular feature of society post-gramophone that we can become intensely familiar with voices that emanate from the bodies of people we have never met. Although these people may be strangers, the sense of familiarity generated by their spoken words can be just as powerful as those spoken by a close friend. Most regular film viewers, for instance, will not fail to recognize the cadences of Morgan Freeman's voice, which has been widely recorded and disseminated, often in the visually disembodied form of a voice-over. At times, this sense of familiarity can be an irritant. Watching an animated film, for instance, we may sometimes hear a voice that we are certain we know, and we cannot rest until we are able to identify the invisible speaker. Diana Sidtis and Jody Kreiman have examined the biological and neurological foundations of recognizing a familiar voice, arguing "that familiar voice patterns are special in human affairs; that their salient role in infant survival begins even before birth; that inherent in each is an elaborate constellation of biographical information; and that it takes the whole brain and, by extension, the whole person to participate in producing and perceiving a voice."1 Thus, voices of strangers have traced pathways in our neural networks such that we cannot help but respond to them. Indeed, the experience of the stranger's voice as familiar is a paradox—but one with profound psychological and even political implications. Andy Serkis's sonic embodiment of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings trilogy (Peter Jackson, 2001–2003) has become both inextricable from J. R. R. Tolkien's character and immediately recognizable to everyone who has seen the films. Serkis was widely praised for his physical performance, which—with the help of motion capture, blend-shape animation, and other types of computer-generated imagery—gave rise to the figure of Gollum. Numerous media scholars have attempted to assess the theoretical implications of this hybrid form of performance.2 Serkis's vocal performance, [End Page 156] however, has been given less attention, most likely because it did not involve complex technological intervention (unlike the visible aspects of his performance). Ironically, this vocal performance is so transformative of Serkis's normal speaking voice that many assumed it had been technologically altered. Sound recordist and editor Chris Ward has noted that "people find it hard to believe that there is no electronic processing applied to the original vocal track to enhance the texture or timbre of Gollum's voice, and even other sound editors have difficulty believing that the magic is one hundred percent pure Andy."3 This virtuoso vocal performance deserves greater attention simply as an artistic production, but what interests me here is that, although the voice of Gollum is not only the voice of a stranger but also that of a fictional, fantastical creature, I would know it anywhere. The familiarity of strangers' voices extends beyond Hollywood, however. Several years into his term, US president Donald Trump's voice has become instantly recognizable even to many who were not already familiar with him from his many years in the celebrity spotlight. Like other presidents before him, his particular speech patterns and intonations are now so well known that they can be impersonated. Alec Baldwin, in particular, has imitated Trump's cadences such that audiences are either amused or offended by the near (though never total) accuracy.4 Moreover, certain phrases Trump has uttered—"When you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them [women] by the pussy. You can do anything"—have been so frequently replayed that I can remember the precise emphases with which he pronounced each word.5 Yet the main way that most people encounter Trump on a daily (or hourly) basis is through his Twitter account. This raises a provocative question: What do we "hear" when we read Trump's tweets? What is "audible" when we are scrolling down a Twitter feed? Of course, we likely read the tweets silently to ourselves, but we also automatically summon an echo of Trump's voice that seems to...
Referência(s)