How You Say It: Why You Talk the Way You Do—and What It Says About You

by Katherine D. Kinzler

From “one of the most brilliant young psychologists of her generation” (Paul Bloom), a groundbreaking examination of how speech causes some of our deepest social divides—and how it can help us overcome them.

We gravitate toward people like us; it’s human nature. Race, class, and gender shape our social identities, and thus who we perceive as “like us” or “not like us”. But one overlooked factor can be even more powerful: the way we speak. As the pioneering psychologist Katherine Kinzler reveals in How You Say It, the way we talk is central to our social identity because our speech largely reflects the voices we heard as children. We can change how we speak to some extent, whether by “code-switching” between dialects or learning a new language; over time, your speech even changes to reflect your evolving social identity and aspirations. But for the most part, we are forever marked by our native tongue—and are hardwired to prejudge others by theirs, often with serious consequences.

Your accent alone can determine the economic opportunity or discrimination you encounter in life, making speech one of the most urgent social-justice issues of our day. Our linguistic differences present challenges, Kinzler shows, but they also can be a force for good. Humans can benefit from being exposed to multiple languages —a paradox that should inspire us to master this ancient source of tribalism, and rethink the role that speech plays in our society.

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Language, Linguistics, Science, Audiobook, Self Help

256 pages, Hardcover

First published July 21, 2020

Reviews

[Charlene Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book How You Say It: Why You Talk the Way You Do -- And What It Says About You discusses a topic I am very familiar with yet do not often consider thoughtfully. As a native Appalachian, I have often enured teasing about my dialect. Growing up, I felt a pang of shame about the way my family spoke. You see, being from southern West Virginia, we had the southern twang and the characteristic vocabulary of the mountain state ¨down pat.¨ Whenever we traveled away from home, we were met with stares of confusion as we placed orders at restaurants and tried to converse with the people we encountered. We were clearly outsiders. At one point, I was determined to master standard grammar and lose the twang. I wanted to disassociate from the shame I felt each time our local ¨country folk¨ spoke. I had learned that outsiders interpreted our dialect to mean we were uneducated, backward hillbillies, and I wanted nothing to do with that characterization.

In this book psychology professor Kathrine D. Kinzler, a graduate of both Yale and Harvard, claims that linguistic discrimination is often overlooked in discussions about implicit bias. Rather than overburdening readers with jargon and details of the science, Kinzler presents relatable examples of how our language shapes us -- and how who we want to become can also shape our language. Using knowledge gained from her own research as well as from others, she explains language development in babies and how they immediately form bonds with people who speak the same language. Through her conversational tone, Kinzler calls attention to the fact that language is often used purposefully to shape and perpetuate harmful biases against groups of people, sometimes through seemingly innocuous stereotypes in pop culture and sometimes deliberately through policies and laws. One of the most significant points to me was that we tend to exclude language in discussions about the value of diversity, a fact the author is clearly working to change.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about how language affects social groupings. Kinzler is a storyteller who dives into the history of language, and that makes this book not only an educational read but an enjoyable one. This is the book I needed when I was struggling with my own language and accent identity, and it is one that could empower many young people who may also feel less valued simply because of their native language.

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating insight on a seemingly obvious topic. How we talk influences others for better or worse.
With so much factual research, the author has delivered an interesting and thought provoking book.
As you read, you find yourself reflecting on the subtle ways you yourself stereotype people without realizing it, and how we can be more open to others despite how they sound to us!

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, but some of the writing, and particularly the repetition, was annoying

[Soha Ashraf · Rating 2 out of 5]

It felt like reading an expository essay on different accents, dialects, and bilinguals.

[Yolanda H · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is so insightful. I had no idea such awesome research was happening in the linguistics field! It made me realize I've benefited immensely from linguistic bias and I've also been guilty of linguistic prejudice in so many subtle ways without even realising it. Particularly when it comes to listening to people who speak English with a foreign or non-native accent regardless of race. An uncomfortable truth but something I'm so happy I'm finally aware of and will actively look out for and work on rectifying going forward.

I'm on a quest to better understand why we do the things we do and also working on being a better communicater in my own life and this was so eye opening and incredibly helpful despite not necessarily being a "self-help" book.

I can honestly say it's changed my world view and is a book I will come back to again and again because there is so much to unpack here and so many lessons learnt from the scientific studies in the book. There are so many insights on how we can all do better and be better listeners who actively seek to improve our relationships with the people around us, particularly those who don't sound like us. This is so essential in a world that doesn't even recognise linguistic discrimination as an issue or encourages it in some cases. Language is more powerful than we know.

The book is written in a very accessible way and requires no prior linguistic or scientific knowledge. So anyone can read it and understand it. I cannot recommend this book enough. I listened to the Audible version and it was fantastic.

[Chris Boutté · Rating 5 out of 5]

The timing of this book couldn’t be better. Right now, there’s a major conversation about racism and biases, but we often don’t think about how language and accents affect the us as well and how we perceive people. This book was extremely eye opening, and I highly recommend it.

[Jolie Radunich · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great educational psychology book not only for students, but people curious to learn how linguistic difference and bias affects them - or how they use it to affect others. Many do not realize how much language is valued in society: people are more likely to turn off race more-so than language or an accent. When it comes to language learning, the age at which someone starts is far more important than the length of time they spend practicing. Accent and language are markers of nurture and not nature. Speaking, whether we like it or not, is a marker of group membership that people use to create social boundaries. And the media is one of the greatest perpetrators of division we have. Kinzler explores the history of linguistics (explaining key terms like Shibboleth), examples of how bias exists today, and a call to action to make language a protected class under the law.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

I debated giving this book 3 or 4 stars. Went with 4 because I’m feeling generous. Liked the first half of the book pretty well, but then she segued from talking about about how people with non-standard English accents face discrimination (true, and a problem) into urging that they be a legally protected class from discrimination (not a good idea, you can’t keep adding to the already long list of protected classes). The very end of the book was a chapter about sexist language, more or less correct but this has been hashed out since the seventies and I don’t think she added anything new.

I think she should have had some more interesting details about what accents are, how they evolve, how people perceive different accents, etc in the first half of the book and just skipped the second half.

[Miles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Summary:

Katherine D. Kinzler’s How You Say It is a book about how our ways of speaking influence our internal, social, and political experiences. Kinzler argues that all people have “language identities” that typically go unacknowledged, and seeks to highlight the importance of such identities in determining various life outcomes. Some sections of the book focus on academic research about language development, including a few linguistic paradoxes we tend to encounter as verbal animals. Other parts explicate language’s role in constructing in-group/out-group categories and explore the pitfalls of “linguistic bias/accent attitudes.” Toward the end, Kinzler urges readers overcome language-based prejudice and embrace “linguistic diversity.” Overall, How You Say It is a serviceable primer on an under-appreciated subject.

Key Concepts and Notes:

––My main takeaway from this book was that we should give people the benefit of the doubt by practicing mindfulness about our language identities and cultivating sensitivity to our linguistic biases and the possible linguistic insecurities of others.
––Kinzler makes some excellent points about the superficiality of racial bias when compared to linguistic bias, effectively arguing that prejudice based on language and/or accent has a much stronger evolutionary basis. She also invites readers to question why linguistic bias continues to be so acceptable, even in progressive/liberal circles.
––I found Kinzler’s point of view to be personally edifying because I hadn’t thought very critically about my own tendency toward linguistic bias, which I think is significant and requires some careful and conscientious revision.
––It was fun to learn about the “monolingual myth”: “the understandable but mistaken assumption that we are better off––and more neurally capable of––learning just one language instead of two or more” (153). I wasn’t raised with this idea so was interested and a bit puzzled to find that it’s a belief many people seem to hold. Glad to have the evidence on hand to refute the monolingual myth should I ever encounter it in my personal or professional life.
––I wholeheartedly agree with Kinzler that promoting bilingualism and multilingualism in our cultural practices and educational policies is critical for the development of more tolerant and open societies. I also think it would help people around the world build a sense of global identification and compassion for all our fellow humans.
––This book is too long and repetitive, despite being very short. It’s a classic example of an academic work that would have been more effective as a longform article but was expanded into a full book for financial/marketing reasons.
––I was very disappointed that Kinzler basically ignored the issues of tone of voice and body language. I feel like these are hugely important aspects of the way people speak that can cause a lot of miscommunication and social strife. I wish Kinzler had included a chapter (or at least a dedicated section of a chapter) addressing the social consequences of saying one thing but communicating something else via tone and/or nonverbal cues.

Favorite Quotes:

Something is missing from the study of social grouping––and from public discourse about tribalism in particular, and human nature in general. Researchers and many other people largely overlook a key factor that determines whether people find common ground: language. More precisely, I’m referring to the way you talk, which often means the accent you speak with. (Yes, you have an accent. Everyone does. It pops up every time you speak.) As the saying goes, it’s not what you say, but how you say it. (ix-x)

The psychology of race is categorical in a way that the genetics are not. Patterns of genetic diversity simply do not match up clearly with what we see, psychologically, as modern racial groups. People’s psychological perception of human difference doesn’t align with the biological reality. This is because the psychology of race isn’t about what is actually in the genome. The psychology of race is about what people think is real.

Some evolutionary psychologists seeking to explain why we evolved to care about race have come up with a bold answer: in short, we didn’t. The psychology of race is not a human necessity. We care about race, psychologically, because of the dramatic consequences it has today for people’s lives, and the way it unites and divides people in our current social world. Yet at a deep level the psychology of race is a modern by-product of an ancient adaptation for caring about human groups more generally. This means that if kids were raised in a world in which race were not a big deal, the psychology of race would likely decline, no longer a necessary way of categorizing and dividing other people. We are built to care about groups; race does not necessarily have to be one of them. The fact that it is says something important about our societies and their recent history, but not necessarily about our evolutionary lineage. (92-3)

Children’s minds are set up to care about language as marking social difference. Children intuit that people who are like each other speak in the same ways, and they orient themselves to familiar-accented people for learning. They think that speaking in different languages or even just different accents is a signal of some other kind of meaningful, broad difference across groups of people. This is a normal function of what it means to be human and predisposed to see the world in categories. In and of itself, this does not need to be bad. Yet when adults taint these early-developing categories with bigotry, children learn to associate languages and the people who speak them with negative, harmful stereotypes. Children are on a journey to figure out who is who and what is what in their social lives––and from day one, language is a tool that they carry on this quest. (113)

People are not typically aware of the consequences of accent discrimination. People––and institutions, such as our legal system––are not aware of how much it can impact people’s lives. When people discriminate against others based on their speech, they may not realize they are doing it. And when they witness other people being discriminatory in this way, they may not understand how problematic it is. Indeed, linguistic bias still seems permissible in a way that other forms of bias no longer are among enlightened, progressive people who seek to treat others equally, without regard to their looks or creed. (126-7)

Bilingualism breaks down social boundaries and may open a path to social openness and tolerance. This is vital for developing children, because in many ways, understanding others––taking their perspective, empathizing with their feelings, and imagining their mental life––cuts to the heart of what it means to have a human interaction. By enhancing our ability to understand others, multilingualism it may offer a small step toward human togetherness––one that counts. (170)

Speech is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the way we talk signals group differences, laying the groundwork for terrible prejudice. On the other hand, speech can give us a strong sense of belonging, helping us find ourselves and our cultural identity, while preparing us to thrive. Learning to speak in more than one language appears to make us more socially perceptive and more cognitively flexible, potentially keeping our minds sharp later in life.

Speech, in short, can be the problem and also the solution. By changing our relationship to language––becoming aware of how much it matters to our social lives, opening up to linguistic diversity in its many forms, and implementing changes to improve our educational, legal, and civic institutions––we can harness the power of speech for the good. The time for this revolution is now. (176)

This review was originally published on my blog, words&dirt.

[Jemailyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5☆

This book presents how language can create barrier among people. That a mere accent of a spoken language can exclude someone from dialogues or conversation or even opportunities. Not only that, race, culture, gender, and religion have their own influence in this divide.

Amazingly, as early as fetal development, language has great influence on one's perception. When a baby is born, the baby tends to connect more with the mother's voice than with any other because since conception, the mother's voice and language are believed to be the constant stimuli to the developing brain. As the baby grows however, cultural and social attitudes have potential to change, based on learned perception, of course.

Language is a form of social bonding, but it can also affect how one think of others. Being articulate and/or having an accent can considerably impact how a person perceive others social and even intellectual standing. Thus, language has the potential to create social belonging or social discrimination.

This book is informative and relatable to the current social issues that many people, including myself, experience on daily basis. As the author mentioned, how you speak is, in a very real way, a window into who you are and how other people see you (perceptions that sometimes may be correct, and sometimes may be prejudiced and inaccurate. And sometimes, if I may add, others will fail to understand.

As the saying goes, it's not what you say, but how you say it. ... and I truly believe in this.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fairly interesting, however I've read content very similar to this before.

3.3/5

[Mark Tadder · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think the first few chapters in the book contained the majority of interesting information. The following 3/4 was basically restatements of the conclusion of the author which over done and rather redundant. I thought this book would have more data and less persuasion. I got it the first time.

[Denise · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating look at how accents can influence the way we perceive others and are perceived by them. Language learning, linguistic bias as well as the connection between language and culture are all topics I find highly interesting. Kinzler's research, while undertaken from an American standpoint and thus centered around English, is equally applicable no matter what language you speak or where you're from - chances are, much of what she writes about is familiar in one way or another. Her results certainly tally with a lot I have experienced myself when it comes to regional accents and dialects in my native language, the learning of new languages at different ages, and the occasional prejudice my distinctly non-native accented and grammatically questionable Finnish evokes from native speakers. An excellent, insightful read.

[Martin Settle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Don't skip the afterword!

The first part of this book is an extremely lucid exposé of how we all hold biases with respect to accent (in surprisingly consistent ways), and how these biases impact both parties in an interaction, as well as limiting us as a community as a whole. I found this to be a helpful addition to recent works on racial and ethnic bias, and a new challenge for me to personally consider how I respond to others in those important initial moments of an interaction.

The author's policy recommendations (primarily in chapters 5 and 6) are helpful, but very United States centric.

[Liz]

I think this book was really interesting! It’s a nice “umbrella” book. It gives a lot information about several topics connected with how we speak. I liked making connections to my friend group or my job throughout the text.

Little though I want to share- it was really interesting how bilingual babies and children were demonstrating seeing from others’ perspectives more than monolingual children! Even before they could speak!

[Adele · Rating 5 out of 5]

100% worth the read. Deeply thought provoking research and insights on how speech patterns, exposure, and multilingualism affects our worldview. A lot to chew on, and opens up a lot of questions on American values and our future in a globalized world.

[McLean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very accessible introduction to sociolinguistic topics such as linguistic discrimination and the broader role that language plays in defining one's social identity.

[BOOKLOVER EB · Rating 4 out of 5]

In "How You Say It," Katherine D. Kinzler, a professor of psychology at the University of Chicago, explores "why you talk the way you do—and what it says about you." Dr. Kinzler analyzes the ways in which the languages we speak, as well as our dialects, accents, and fluency affect every aspect of our lives. How we speak can brand us in the eyes of others as desirable or someone to avoid, and can boost or sink our chances at job interviews.

The author offers some intriguing anecdotes, such as this one about Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Linguists have compared the way Justice Ginsburg spoke when she was a young lawyer to her enunciation in recent years on the high court. During her youth, Ruth took pains to make a good impression by pronouncing her words crisply and carefully. However, when her career was more firmly established, she lapsed into an accent more consistent with her Brooklyn roots. Sometimes, Kinzler suggests, we try to alter our speech to suit particular occasions.

Although it lags at times and has some repetitious passages, on the whole, "How You Say It" is a well-researched, informative, and scholarly book. Dr. Kinzler cites studies that reveal the uncanny ability of small children to absorb languages and suggests that bilingualism may broaden one's cultural awareness and promote empathy. She believes that speech is "a window into who you are and how other people see you." During our turbulent times, what we say and how we say it can bring us closer together or fuel our prejudices and resentments. This timely and thought-provoking work of non-fiction emphasizes the role of language and speech in many areas, such as education, the law, employment, housing, parenting, and interpersonal relationships.

[Lori S. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Decades ago I was a linguistics student and the interest has never left me. So this book really was a great fit for me. I really enjoyed reading it and it expanded on some of the social and anthropological aspects of linguistics I would have studied back then. I found it quite fascinating and it seemed well researched and written. What it really brought home again is how much language is a force in our lives, be it subtle or quite overt.

The greatest part of this book was how it showed that language can be the basis of bias in so many ways. Be it racial, ethically or just a matter of regional accents. It's well known people form opinions based on appearance but the way we speak isn't often considered when we think about our opinions of others and theirs of us.

I give this a solid four stars.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for sharing an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Gary Schroeder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, just okay. I picked this up because of my long-standing curiosity over regional accents. Having moved from one part of the U.S. that has a significant accent (western PA) to another part of the country that has one of our wildest accents (New York), I've always been intrigued by the topic. This book does go into regional accents and talks about how some accents are perceived as low-status, while others are perceived as high. It does so from the perspective of human psychology and the bottom line is that we like people who are like us. In fact, this entire book could have been called "People Are Biased Towards People Who Are Like Themselves" and you'd essentially have the complete takeaway.

It's not a bad book but it spends a lot of time talking about academic linguistic studies that are not likely to be of great interest to anyone who doesn't hold a position in a university linguistics or psychology department. (In fact, it may cause you to think that the people who are conducting these studies do so from an extreme position of privilege since much of it seems so esoterically fatuous.)

In addition to discussions of how we harmonize best with people who are like us, the author spends some time on the topic of bilingualism and what advantages it may confer on children who are raised in a bilingual environment.

All in all, this could have been a nice long-form article in the Sunday magazine section of your newspaper. Not sure it warranted an entire (if brief) book.

[Odette Lattimer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you for the advanced copy. This is only my second book I believe I have read on linguistics.

The book is well researched and well written, I found some of the content fascinating. The biases we form based on how other people speak is a fascinating topic.

[Tricia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent book about the way people talk and how that impacts people’s perceptions of others. Especially interested in the fact that accent bias is one of the last legal holdouts for racial discrimination.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know much of this research, as someone who teaches and researches in this field. But Kinzler did a good job of explaining it for the public. The purported cognitive benefits of bilingualism are not holding up, though. Kinzler may ultimately regret having suggested that they are real.

[Rebecca Rogers · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you’re interested in the intersection of linguistics with social psychology, this is a yes for you! I loved it, and Kinzler articulated my thoughts on how multilingualism should be a focus in schools due to the benefits for our kids as citizens of the world.

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

The content of this book is good, however it felt a little like someone took a really good couple of chapters from an anthology or longer journal articles and tried to develop enough supplemental material to hit some word or page count to get to something one can rightly call a book. If the topic is of interest to you, by all means check this title out.

[Maddie Ostergaard · Rating 5 out of 5]

An enjoyable and informative read! Accent bias and accent discrimination is definitely prevalent although is not spoken about as much as other forms of prejudice.

Also totally wish I was polylingual. And it totally makes sense that there is more cognitive flexibility and other benefits despite the fact that it was previously believed that it would hold kids back (what?! Americans are so creatively racist and xenophobic).

This is an important book!

[Melissa Hokanson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so enlightening and made me see thing I’ve never thought of before! Good read!!

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know how yet, but I want to teach with this in the spring.

[Clayton Ellis · Rating 4 out of 5]

An atypical look at how yet another aspect of our daily existence can bring us together or separate people. So much insight.

[Edward Sullivan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting examination of linguistic biases, and the social assumptions and stereotypes they produce.