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Caroline Chan
MC / Show Host
20,354 views| 5  Posts

A voice of my own

I've got my snarky voice on this morning.  I don't know why.  I don't think I'm in a particularly snarky mood.  I think I'm tired.  And when I'm tired, I do away with all the niceties that I normally lace throughout my correspondences.  But I caught myself a few times where even I thought it was a bit harsh.  But I'm not really in the mood to censor or re-write, so the recipients will just have to deal with my tone.

I guess my writing style is a bit different from others.  I tend to write with an emphasis on tone, pacing and cadence.  It sounds kind of weird, but I think words have colours, emotions and energy.  I know, totally flaky stuff, but think about the next time you read something.  Why did the writer choose to use that word and not another.  In the English language, there are enough words out there that have synonyms so really, it's the writer's choice.  So you can colour your phrases with the words you choose.  For instance, in my previous entry, I wrote "makes me take pause."  It's technically correct.  It's just not the most elegant of phrases.  But I didn't want it to be elegant.  I wanted you, the reader, to feel the awkwardness I felt in the situation.  Taking out one word would have kept the meaning and changed the colour.  (Don't you love language?)

Which is probably why my writing is better suited for broadcast.  When you're reading, you might speed through the text and miss the nuances.  In broadcast, you are forced to hear the true nature of the words and their relationship with each other.

I'm told that my actual voice is quite softspoken.  It doesn't really carry snarky very well.  You might hear sarcasm, but that's because of the content rather than the tone and the volume.  But if the occasion calls for it, I can make myself be heard with great force.  One of the survival techniques from years in noisy newsrooms :)

about 15 years ago 0 likes  2 comments  0 shares
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Xie xie! Ni gen hao le!
about 15 years ago

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Languages Spoken
english, cantonese, french
Location (City, Country)
Hong Kong
Gender
female
Member Since
November 18, 2009