Dear Girls,

Totally like whatever, you know? Part 2

The words we use and how we use our voices both say a lot about us. Have you seen girls who look lovely—they have taken care with their clothing, faces and hair—but when they start to speak they shatter the picture of beauty they had created with their harsh and grating or crude or low class manner of speaking? When we think of glorifying God as women and presenting an image of beautiful, virtuous womanhood we need to think of our clothing and our hair and our faces (makeup and expression) and also of our voices and our bearing and how we carry ourselves and act.

Have you seen the old movie Singing in the Rain? It is set at the time when talkies were just beginning to be made and is about an actress seeking to make the transition from silent movies to the talkies. She had been a very popular actress in silent movies. She was attractive and dramatic. But as soon as she began to talk the director realised he had a problem. Her voice was awful. It was whiny and high-pitched. Audiences just laughed at her. She was no longer the romantic heroine. Now she was just scorned. Her voice broke the illusion the costumes, set and lighting were all trying to create. So the director came up with a brilliant idea. He found a lady with a truly beautiful, soothing, gentle voice and had her speak while the other lady acted. The movie shows clearly how important our voices are.

I recently bought a book called Ethel Cotton’s Course in Conversation. It is a book which teaches you how to use your voice and points out things you should think about when speaking. It concentrates on four aspects of our voice in conversation:

· The ideas and topics we can bring into conversation. The book helps you compile lots of interesting things to include in conversation so that you can engage in and enjoy the high adventure of conversing with others.

· The vocabulary we use. Ethel Cotton teaches those using her course how to root out clichés and commonly used words such as those in the poem from the last newsletter(totally, like, whatever, you know?) and how to replace these with our own sayings and personalized vocabulary.

· The tone in our voice. We can train ourselves to avoid speaking in a nasal, emotionless, sarcastic, irritating way and learn to speak in a melodic, comforting, sweet and mellow way.

· Our diction. The book contains exercises to help us speak clearly and to enunciate each of our words.

You can get the book from amazon.com.

Let us think about the conversational topics, vocabulary, tone and diction we have and try to glorify God through edifying topics, a sterling vocabulary, a sweet tone and clear diction!

For the Greater Glory of God through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,

Genevieve Smith

Issacharian Daughter