Abstract
We change and alter our voices – both physically and metaphorically – depending on our environment, our interactions, and for personal safety, but what is our voice when we are by ourselves? Finding ways to elicit the inner voice has the potential to help women claim their voices and, thereby, enhance their creative self-expression. This paper is a post-structural feminist, process-based investigation into the nuanced construction of women's voices in contemporary Western society, drawing on my findings from my Master of Creative Arts (MCA) project, which included a written playscript that utilised oracle cards as provocations. Furthermore, it examines vocal generosity (Cahill & Hamel 2019) and how voices are socially constructed. The presentation will demonstrate how oracle cards can be utilised as provocations for theatrical playwriting. I will present excerpts from my exegesis, oracle deck sample and playscript to demonstrate the practice-led outcomes. The research employed autoethnographic reflective writing to investigate the construction of voice through performance and writing. In a society rich with stimuli and laden with noise, finding one's voice —that is, one’s sociopolitical position, what one stands for, and one’s capacity to voice personal truths—amongst the noise proves increasingly challenging. So, does creative self-expression have the potential for self-liberation by cutting through the noise in dialogue with oneself?