"Sexy baby voice" is an English language speech pattern or sociolect, first described by U.S. media in 2013, in which young women affect the high-pitched voice of pre-pubescent girls. Actress Lake Bell popularized the term with her 2013 film In a World... , and subsequently gave various interviews on the speech pattern.
The speech patterns at issue are described as sounding "like Minnie Mouse on helium", [1] or a "mousy squeak [with a] handful of gravel tossed across the very top of the register". [2] Actress Lake Bell described the style as an amalgamation of "valley-girl voice" (characterized by "upspeak" and vocal fry) and high pitch. [1]
"Sexy baby voice" is controversial in discussions about gender equality and related issues. Bell [3] and others have argued that the use of "sexy baby voice" demeans the speaker, who appears as a "submissive 12-year-old trying to be a sex object", [2] or that its use in film and television exploits contemporary culture's "fetish for adult sexuality wrapped in adolescent packages". [4]
Others questioned the purpose of critiquing the speech pattern, asserting that "picking at the vocal quirks of your own gender is just as much of a nuisance as harping on the bodies that belong to them". [2] Phonetician Mark Liberman wrote that it was not clear that the discussion about "sexy baby voice" referred to a specific speech pattern rather than just "a long list of things about various female-associated vocal features that people don't like". He also noted previous discussions about similar female speech patterns in earlier decades, such as a controversy about "uptalk" in the 1990s. [5]