A Quote by Micheline Aharonian Marcom

I never feel like I am "using" a voice, rather I am listening to a voice and recording it as faithfully as it comes to me and as I can. I think that the female sex is much maligned, even in our supposedly sexually "open" society. It is the site of a woman's pleasure, and the source of (most) children's entry into the world, and an ancient symbol of power and fecundity, and we are directly or indirectly told in modern times that it's dirty, shameful, ugly, odorous, and to be hidden away.
A sex symbol? A symbol of sex? I don't think that I am a sex symbol, although it's very flattering. I'm 59, now, so I think I'm possibly past my sell-by date. I think I am.
There are times when the voice of repining is completely drowned out by various louder voices: the voice of government, the voice of taste, the voice of celebrity, the voice of the real world, the voice of fear and force, the voice of gossip.
When the kirtan is harmonious with so many people, it’s a tumultuous beautiful sound. We can’t hear just one voice during the chorus; or rather we do hear one voice. But that one voice is actually the sound of everyone’s voice in harmony. That’s our offering to God. And why is it so pleasing to the Lord? Because we are all cooperating for a higher purpose. We are all united for the pleasure of the center, for the pleasure of Krishna, in spite of all our differences.
I am aware that somewhere along the line, I've subconsciously turned down the pitch of my speech, like a silencer of a gun that softens the sound of its firing. Now, even when I yell, I don't feel like I am using my full voice.
Because drumming was recognized as an ancient source and symbol of the power of female technicians of the sacred, drumming was banned. Henceforth divinity was to be exclusively masculine. The suppression of women was directly linked to the suppression of the goddess.
I have often felt like I was the only one fighting against female genital mutilation. There is still a huge taboo surrounding the topic, because it involves the most private parts of the female´s body. But whenever I feel like this is too much for me to do, I read e-mails and messages I receive every day from people thanking me for speaking up for them, for giving them a voice. These messages let me know that I am not alone, and that what I do is worthwhile.
Until I am free to write bilingually and to switch codes without having always to translate, while I still have to speak English or Spanish when I would rather speak Spanglish, and as long as I have to accommodate the English speakers rather than having them accommodate me, my tongue will be illegitimate. I will no longer be made to feel ashamed of existing. I will have my voice: Indian, Spanish, white. I will have my serpent's tongue - my woman's voice, my sexual voice, my poet's voice. I will overcome the tradition of silence.
I have a voice inside. A voice that I am forever trying to silence. A voice that calls me in when I want to be out, playing. A voice that is always sad. That is always terrified. That always wants to sit in the darkened room, away from noise and movement and colour - away from any experience that could prove to be challenging.
I am not sexually attracted to women. I would rather sleep with an ugly man than with a woman.
Being a woman in the pop world, sexuality is half poison and half liberation. What's the line? I don't have a line. I am the most sexually free woman on the planet, and I genuinely am empowered from a very honest place by my sexuality. What's more primal than sex? I mean, it's so honest. If I didn't think I had the talent to back that up, I wouldn't have done it.
I feel like I've started to create my own culture of being a voice for something, and that's what people want to know about. I love that because I am a woman and because I a rap, and I look the way I look, I can connect with the demographic of people who feel like they have a voice in me.
Art is never the voice of a country, it is an even more precious thing, the voice of the individual, doing its best to speak, not comfort of any sort, but truth. And the art that speaks it most unmistakably, most directly, most variously, most fully, is fiction.
Nina Simone had such an androgynous voice; the first time I listened to her I thought it was a man, and I'm sure a lot of people listening to me think I'm a woman. Her voice is kinda like the poster child for me.
I am glad that I am not raising kids today. And I’m rather pessimistic that my grandchildren will enjoy the great society that I’ve enjoyed in my lifetime. I really think it’s coarsened. It’s coarsened in so many ways. One of the things that upsets me about modern society is the coarseness of manners. You can’t go to a movie — or watch a television show for that matter — without hearing the constant use of the F-word — including, you know, ladies using it. People that I know don’t talk like that!
I feel most spiritual when I am listening to a soprano voice soaring to the top of its range at the most dramatic point of an aria. It feels like a geyser shooting up from the center of the earth and reaching for the stars.
Even as a woman who has a voice in the world, I struggle to find it, to use it, to keep it, to stretch it, to take risks with my words. And I don't think I'm alone. I think the most powerful women among us struggle with how to use their voice. Because I think what every woman knows, is that when she speaks her truth she is at risk - whether it's Hillary Clinton or a rural woman in Rwanda.
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