Carol Gilligan’s Human Voice Represents the 21st Century

Review of Carol Gilligan’s In a Human Voice (New Jersey: Polity Press, 2023), ISBN 978-1-5095-5678-6, 131 pages, paperback, $14.95.

In her groundbreaking book, In a Different Voice (1982), Carol Gilligan brought women’s voices that were “inconspicuously” missing from psychological studies at the time into the conversation. She found it startling that women, who made up at least half of the population, were not represented in the samples of these studies. Her book changed the discourse when it appeared, shedding much-needed light on a woman’s experience, highlighting her own psychological growth, conception of morality, and what she deemed most important in life—to name just some of the areas she explored. Gilligan continues to be actively engaged by writing, teaching at New York University, and sharpening her thinking about topics that matter deeply to her. A feminist and activist at heart, she has always maintained a keen interest in the psychology of women and men, moral development, and freedom of expression.

Now, four decades later, she has come out with another thought-provoking and evocative book that has been baking for years, if not decades. In it, she shares how her thinking has evolved in light of new research as well as a changed (and, I might add, charged) social and political climate. While gender still looms large in the story she tells, it is not her main focus. What is it then? “It’s a human story.” More to the point, the different voice (which sounded feminine) is actually a human voice with capacities such as empathy, caring, sensitivity, and emotional intelligence, which are seen as universal human potentials that exist in every-

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one.

In a Human Voice is a short read containing five chapters packed into 131 pages. While I found many valuable gems throughout her book, her Introduction lays a firm foundation with much fertile soil from which her newer ideas sprout in the following chapters. For example, Gilligan elucidates what she means by gendered splits and their sequelae. She states that children (and adults) must be able to think about what they are feeling (emotional intelligence), know what is happening in their bodies (embodied minds), and engage in relationships with others (relational selves). This integration leads to healthy development.

Alternatively, under a patriarchal system, gendered splits result in unhealthy development as both genders conceal what they really think and feel to preserve the existing order of things. She offers a way out of this quagmire with a three-pronged approach: “radical listening” (e.g., asking her subjects, what do you “really” think and “actually feel?”); “resistance” to the initiation process of accommodating to the gender codes of patriarchy; and heeding “the tale of the emperor’s new clothes.” When a naked emperor covers himself with the most exquisite royal finery, only a boy names what he sees—an emperor without clothes.

Gilligan discusses an initiation process children go through to learn the extant gender codes. For boys, this happens earlier, between the ages of four and seven. They learn not to show feelings or say things that can be construed as “girly,” “babyish,” or “gay.” Here, she cites psychoanalyst Donald Moss, who recalls a painful memory in kindergarten. Asked to recite the song he most cherished at an assembly, he chooses a beloved lullaby from “Hansel and Gretel.” He starts to sing and notices the shock on the boys’ faces. He quickly switches gears, says, “Just kidding,” and sings a marine hymn instead.

Girls experience the initiation process a few years later, leading up to adolescence. By their teen years, their initiation has been firmly established; they’ve learned to hide their inner or “under” voice and say what is socially sanctioned. In essence, children and, later, adults, learn to sacrifice their authentic self to have relationship. Ironically, women learn to silence their voice to maintain connection while men sacrifice connection to maintain their voice (often to hold onto power and privilege and/or avoid being seen as less masculine). Inevitably, both genders suffer. It stands to reason that if children grow up in environments where they are encouraged to express themselves more honestly, openly, and authentically, they form more intimate connections.

Reading Gilligan’s book left me with much food for thought. I was impressed by her openness to challenge her own ideas about voice, the gender binary, and what lies at the heart of her studies. I admired her stance of curiosity over judgment and her pursuit of the real story that could only be told with radical listening. Also, I resonated with her ap-

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proach to looking beyond black-and-white thinking—the male-female binary—to look for and find the greys and dashes of color. All this yielded a richer and more vibrant palette of the human voice.

Coincidentally, after finishing this book, I found an opinion piece in The New York Times related to the final chapter of Gilligan’s book. In her piece, “Boys Get Everything, Except the Thing That’s Most Worth Having” (June 5, 2024), Ruth Whippman points out that boys seem to have it all, but what they don’t have is connection. I find this true in my work with male patients and men in my divorcing dads’ group. In a safe circle, dads share more candidly how they miss the connections they had while married—relationships their wives had cultivated—and how they feel lonely and grateful to have a space to be emotionally vulnerable. As you might expect, this openness and shared vulnerability have led them to form close bonds with the other men.

More personally, I found it interesting to reflect on my own voice as I read this book. How freely do I express my thoughts and feelings? Even in writing this review, I considered what to say, how to say it, and possible judgment. I also resonated with Gilligan’s observation that when women say “I don’t know,” they really do know but insert the word “don’t”—perhaps a warning not to say what they truly think and feel to avoid upsetting someone and potentially rupture or lose a connection. Reflecting on my own analysis some years ago, I recall saying “I don’t know” to certain questions my analyst would ask me, and his retort, “You don’t know?” Of course, I did.

Gilligan’s notion of a human voice offers a ray of hope in the dark clouds of the present moment and time. I’d like to echo a phrase psychiatrist Harry Stack Sullivan coined: “We are all more human than otherwise.” However, our flaws and imperfections are also part of what makes us human. We live in a world filled with many cracks sorely in need of repair. Perhaps we might see (from Kabbalistic/Jewish mystical teaching) our flaws and these cracks as a portal through which more light can filter in.

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