ABSTRACT
Except for scholars in communication disorders, communication researchers do not
generally use the term literally when they refer to someone “not having a voice.” Usually
the phrase refers to a person or group of people without the rhetorical power to influence
events or without the ability to make a strong statement (e.g., Bell, 1997). However, in
addition to those who are born without the ability to speak, there are people who literally
had a voice and lost it, imposing oral-verbal silence-that is, a primarily nonvocal state.