The Phenomenology of Voice- Hearing and Two Concepts of Voice

Abstract

The experiences described in the Voices in Psychosis transcripts are incredibly varied and yet frequently explicitly labelled by participants as ‘voices’. How can we make sense of this? If we reflect carefully on uses of the word ‘voice’, we see that it can express at least two entirely different concepts, which pick out categorically different phenomena. One concept picks out a speech sound (e.g. ‘This synthesizer has a “voice” setting’). Another concept picks out a specific agent (e.g. ‘I hear two voices: one is a ten-year-old boy...’). This chapter explores how these two concepts are related to each other in the context of voice-hearing.