Meaning & use
authentic voice
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Meanings
nouncountable
A way of writing or speaking that sounds like the real, individual person behind it, not copied or fake.
Grammar: Countable; often used with 'a' or 'the', e.g. 'She found her authentic voice.'
Patterns
- find your authentic voice
- an authentic voice in something
- give someone an authentic voice
After years of imitating other writers, she finally found her authentic voice.
The novel's authentic voice comes from the author's own childhood memories.
Critics praised the film for giving an authentic voice to ordinary workers.
nouncountable
A person or group that speaks for a community in a way that feels true to that community's real experience.
Grammar: Countable; often followed by 'for' or 'of' plus a group, e.g. 'an authentic voice for young voters'.
Patterns
- an authentic voice for someone
- an authentic voice of something
The newspaper aims to be an authentic voice for the immigrant community.
She became an authentic voice of rural women in politics.
The choir is an authentic voice of the region's musical traditions.
Word forms
| plural | authentic voices |
|---|
Common combinations
- find your authentic voice
- It took him ten years to find his authentic voice as a songwriter.
- an authentic voice for
- The union presents itself as an authentic voice for low-paid workers.
- speak in an authentic voice
- The diary speaks in an authentic voice that readers trust.
- lose your authentic voice
- Too much editing can make a writer lose their authentic voice.
Synonyms and how they differ
- genuine voice
- Very close, but 'genuine' stresses honesty and lack of fakery, while 'authentic' stresses being true to the original person or source.
- true voice
- More literary and less common; it suggests loyalty to a real self rather than the everyday idea of sounding real.
- original voice
- Focuses on being new and different, not necessarily on being true to the speaker's real experience.
Opposites
Word family
- authentic adjective
- Real and not copied; the base adjective behind this phrase.
- authenticity noun
- The quality of being real or true to the original.
- authentically adverb
- In a way that is real and not imitated.
Commonly confused: authentic voice or authoritative voice?
authentic voice vs authoritative voice
An 'authoritative voice' sounds confident and expert; an 'authentic voice' sounds real and personal. They are not the same.
Practice
The young poet was praised for writing in a(n) ______ voice that reflected her own life.
Choose one answer.
'Authentic' means true to the writer's real self, which fits 'reflected her own life'. 'Authoritative' means expert and commanding, not personal; 'artificial' and 'borrowed' are the opposite of what the sentence praises.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “authentic voice”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.