posted
OSC made this comment in the thread "A fictional story of Jesus?"
quote: Another thing: We Mormons are very cautious about using the name "Jesus" anyway. We rarely use his name except in prayer (all prayers end in the name of Jesus Christ) or when referring to him during his mortal life. All other references, including to Christ resurrected, use either "Christ" or various other titles, like Savior or Redeemer or Lord.
Which is why Mormons are extremely uncomfortable with Christian religions that "buddy up" to the Lord by calling him by his first name all the time. Makes us uncomfortable just to hear it, mostly, because we're so careful about how we use his name. Not that we criticize others for using it differently. Just ... that's how we feel about the Savior, and how we speak about him.
This made me think about 'familiarity' in society. Of course, I'm a bit stiff and socially awkward, but I don't like to use someone's first name until they give me permission to use it. I consider it presumptuous. In some latin societies, I think I'm correct in saying that it is considered rude to use familiar address with someone you just met. It's built into the language.
I think some of this changes with age. When I was younger, I pretty much called everyone by Mr. or Mrs. Surname, or sir or ma'am out of respect, because that is the way I was raised.
Now that I'm middle-aged, it would just seem weird to me to call people of my same age or younger by "Mr. So-n-So" unless they are in a position of authority over me. I have been known to call Mr. Card by "Scott" here on Hatrack, even though I have never met him -- simply because this seems to be a more informal place, and because we are near in age -- he isn't several years older than me. However, I don't know what I would do if I met him in person.
I also agree with you that this is probably more of an American tendency toward informality than in other cultures.
posted
personally - and this may be from growing up in the south - I can't think of addressing someone I don't know very well with anything other than "sir" or "ma'am". In person, that is. If anything less respectful came out of my mouth, I'd have gotten a swat. Online relationships breed an odd sort of familiarity in that you can be whatever you choose to be online - and for most of us, it's our regular personality condensed. There is a lack of formality I think because we all start out on an even field. We say things to other people that we would never DREAM of saying face to face - because we are faceless entities. Intelligent, but inhuman to some small degree becuase we're on the other side of the screen you're looking at. No face to associate, so fewer boundaries and rules to follow. When I'm online with people I know, I will read and react differently to what they type. I hear it in my head as spoken words. I can't disassociate them from their online persona. Those who I've never met are in a totally different category - no voice. Just words.
Posts: 262 | Registered: Jun 2004
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quote:I also agree with you that this is probably more of an American tendency toward informality than in other cultures.
An annoying symptom of this is when a checker at a store sees my check or my credit card and then proceeds to call me by my first name.
Posts: 751 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I'm from the south, but I went to college in Montana. One of the things I noticed is that the forms of address are much more familiar in Montana.
I grew up calling everyone sir, ma'am, Mr. and Mrs. My friends' parents were Mr. and Mrs. So and so.
In Montana, everyone goes by their first name. My friends' parents were Chris and Denise, not Mr. and Mrs. In fact, they routinely corrected my inevitable slip-ups.
Even my professors, guys with doctorates, went by their first names. I never did get used to it.
Posts: 5462 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
As a missionary for the LDS church, my mission president was fond of saying "familiarity breeds contempt." To a certain degree, I think that is true.
For example, Farmgirl said that when she was younger, she addressed adults as Mr or Mrs or whatever their title was. However, as she has become an adult herself, she feels strange not calling other adults by their first name. As we age, our peer group ages as well, and we are nearly always on familiar terms with our peer group.
However, with a trend in the US of youth becoming more familiar with adults, i.e. calling them by their first names, I think also increases the disrespect that many youth have for adults. Not addressing someone by their first name automatically commands some respect.
I have a friend who has her 3 year old son call her by her first name. I see problems in discipline now and down the road.
I'm not very familiar with other cultures with the exception on Singapore(my husband's stepmother) and I know that there the elders are almost reverenced.
Just some thoughts. . .
Posts: 77 | Registered: Feb 2005
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posted
I think that respect for others in general is going by the wayside in America. Younger classmen don't respect the seniors. No one respects the teachers. New college grads don't respect their bosses. And hardly any one respects the president anymore. Not everyone is like this but it seems to be a definate upcoming trend
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posted
Here in Spain all that is very different. Maybe it's because the respect is not associated only with the way of going ("tu" and "usted", different ways of saying you) but "usted" (the most respectful) only is in use neither with strangers, nor at least with the teachers (except with the most major, but because they make it better, not for their age). The only teacher whom I call by name and surname is the one that more confidence I have, and to some even for yheir nickname...
But it is not a lack of respect. They do not feel offended and certainly we can go like towards other cultures. Really I feel very strange on having imagined to call my father "sir"...
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posted
I am horrible with names. On my mission, whenever I forgot somebody's name, I would be ultra-polite and call them "Senhor" or "Senhora". Posts: 751 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I do all opposite, because on having said "Señor" or "Señora" is too evident that I have forgotten the names and I try to call their attention of some form. With the people who has not said his name to me if I use Señor, because it cannot only very polite to say: " Eh, you "
Posts: 111 | Registered: Aug 2004
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quote: An annoying symptom of this is when a checker at a store sees my check or my credit card and then proceeds to call me by my first name.
Yes, this is REALLY annoying, especially since I don't go by my first name. At my grocery store, they call us Mister and Missus (last name).
Posts: 262 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
I always appreciate people who call me Mr. Card until I have invited them to call me by my first name. I try to extend the same courtesy to others.
And I loathe cold-call salesmen who phone me and call me "Orson" or even - and this will make you laugh almost as hard as I gagged - "Ors."
Oddly enough, though, in referring to Jesus during his mortal ministry, I would find it hideously disrespectful to speak of him as "Mr. Jesus." So the Mr. thing doesn't ALWAYS convey respect.
And in public debates, as soon as someone starts referring to (not addressing) his opponent as "Mr. X" instead of just his last name or "my worthy opponent," you know that the effect is to denigrate: the "Mr." is assumed to be ironic.
Weird how context changes the meaning AND the degree of formality of Mr.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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posted
As a Mormon, I've always addressed other LDS who are older than me as "Brother" or "Sister" ______. Thus whenever I've addressed OSC in conversation he has been "Brother Card." This is a bit weird at book signings, but I can't bring myself to address him as anything else. The same goes with Sister Card, but interestingly, I have inadvertantly broken the "Brother/Sister" rule a few times with Kristine, probably because that's what she's referred to on Hatrack (oddly, I associate her with Hatrack more than OSC.) So Sister Card, if your reading this, I'm sorry I've called you Kristine a few times. No disrespect intended.
With non-Mormons, it's always Mr. or Mrs. unless they prefer otherwise. Interestingly, I've never addressed a director or fellow actor in any play I've been in as anything other than their first name. There's something about theatre that calls for familiarity.
Posts: 786 | Registered: Jun 2003
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posted
One of the most difficult things in moving from my undergraduate program to my graduate program was learning to address my professors by their first names. It's the culture of our department. The only people who DON'T do it are extremely new to the department and, like me, probably came from schools where it was always Professor or Dr. So and So (I did my undergrad at a private college in Memphis, TN).
In undergrad, oddly enough, the reason we used the formal address was not necessarily because of the wishes of the professors themselves. Many of them (especially the younger ones) would invite us to use first names. Some people (generally NOT from the South) would attempt it and give up fairly quickly.
I know that to this day even imagining calling those professors by their first names makes me vaguely anxious. There's only one I really keep in contact with, and I've recently begun using her first name, but it still makes me feel out of line, somehow.
One of the professors in undergrad explained her experience like this. Originally, she had attempted to get students to call her by her first name. However, it is PAINFUL to watch students at Rhodes attempt to do that. So, since they persisted in calling her "Doctor ___", she tried calling them Mr. or Ms. So&So, as she wanted to foster as egalitarian relationship as possible (she says that when her physician calls her by her first name, she calls him by his.) Yeah. Well, that whole "Mr./Ms." thing really just ticked people off. So she finally just gave up and accepted it for what it is.
So, when I moved to North Dakota, I just didn't call any of my professors anything for awhile. And then I just gradually got used to the first name thing by degrees, so now it's natural.
And then when I went back to the south for doc interviews, I couldn't call any of the professors anything because I found I'd gotten used to assuming a first name relationship with everybody.
As far as the sir/ma'am thing... where I grew up, it was stressed. However, my mother would get LIVID if I called her ma'am. Apparently, in her ears it sounded snotty (even if I'd meant to sound apologetic and compliant). (She's from ND, I was brought up in Texas.)
My father, a high school math teacher, says that the big difference between teaching in North Dakota and Texas is that in ND, when he'd ask students to do something, they'd say "No" and then they'd do it. Whereas, in Texas when he asks students to do something, they say, "Yes, sir, Mr. Williams" and then they don't do it.
posted
As a young person (I'm in my early 20s), I still find it weird when people call me 'ma'am'. I feel like they’re talking about my mother. I like being called Ms. -Surname- though, if I've never met someone in my life. Give me five seconds and I'll have told them to call me by my first name, but that first introduction still needs to keep a bit of informality.
In Britain it's normal to call university professors by their first name. They get embarrassed and correct you if you don't. We're always trying to persuade the American exchange students not to keep trying to call them 'Professor', instead of 'Joe'.
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posted
I'm not sure that it's "normal" to call UK professors by their first name. I only ever had one professor at uni in Scotland tell the class to call him by his first name - and he was American!
Even so, by the fourth year I was there, we had smaller, more personal classes, and i've always found it weird to call someone Mr. / Professor X when they're calling you by your first name.
At my Israeli university right now I seem to totally avoid calling them anything in class, and WRITE to them as "Dear Professor X".
So I'm not sure that there is anything in it culturally. It's probably just the preferences of individual lecturers (and the students!).
Posts: 66 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
In Israel, this issue of appropriate communication with the teachers is, indeed, quite problematic.
While in English-speaking countries you can always refer to your teacher as “Professor” or “Professor X”, in Israel there is no proper name for a teacher except for “Morë” (or “Mora” if it’s a woman), and it is pronounced in such a way that usually reflects lack of respect. Only in post high-school academic institutions do students use the term “Professor”, but only in the English department or if the teacher technically holds the status of an academic professor.
Other respect titles towards your teacher (in Hebrew: “Mar”, “Adoni”, “Gevirti”) are not commonly used for the last several decades, and students who use them are usually conceived as “pets” or just odd.
So what happens eventually, is that students everywhere call teachers by their first names, disrespect increases, and the educational level, which went down horribly in the past few years, gets even worse.
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quote: My father, a high school math teacher, says that the big difference between teaching in North Dakota and Texas is that in ND, when he'd ask students to do something, they'd say "No" and then they'd do it. Whereas, in Texas when he asks students to do something, they say, "Yes, sir, Mr. Williams" and then they don't do it.
posted
When I was in college, my father used to become irate when he would hear my friends and I talking about classes and saying things like "I have Sellers for math" or "I have Johnson for British lit." He saw it as a sign of disrespect not to include some kind of title before the last name. Obviously, we would never have addressed these people simply by their last names. It was more a function of reading the names as they were written on our schedules. Dad was pretty hardcore about titles and respect.
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posted
In my department, Undergrads call professors "Dr. ____" but grad students call professors within their own area by their first names. Though, if you are dealing with a professor outside your area, you usually call them "Dr. ____" Which can make your thesis defense seem a bit odd, since there are two people who are are on a first name basis with and one person who you call "Dr. ____"
I'm guessing by his posts, OSC doesn't have any "Jesus is my homeboy" shirts. You don't get much more irreverent than that without really trying. I've always wondered why someone thought that shirt was a good idea.
posted
Wow... i didn 't expect to see all this... neat though.
When I was 12, one of my paper route customers and I had many interesting conversations... some on the subject of religion. (He happened to be a Rosecrutian). The subject of the 'Bro.' & 'Sis.' form of address came up. He commented that he didn't like it because there is an element of expectation in it. Perhaps there is and it's the "buddy up" concept that got me started on this.
I had in mind the guy that wants something from you... money... whatever. He starts out... Del, I got this real great deal. Can I call ya Del? He then procedes without waiting for an answer.
I guess I've become a little cynical in my old age. I think the lack of respect is endemic in America. It's like that quote... "It's the economy stupid.", or the line from the movie 'Mobsters'... "What's the secret of America?"... "MONEY!". Personal relations and respect seem to mean less than what one can get out of it.
Paul Theroux in his book "Sir Vidia's Shadow" indicated his displeasure at students at UVA, that would call him 'Paul' and then demand a better grade than they got... to use his words... like they demanded his wallet. The whole story was about the expectations of friendship.
Many of you have touched on these ideas as did Mr. Card, and I thank you all for the responses.
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posted
It definetly depends on the age. You aren't going to go around calling a seven year old Mr.Fischer...
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posted
There was a time when I might have refered to such a young one as "young man", and in any conversation, I might have smiled and said things in an effort to afford him dignity... perhaps even saying "sir" to him in such a way as to let him know that this is how civilized men talk to each other.
But in this day and 'cultural' environment; a day where we have such things as Michael Jackson and the inapproprate behaviors of some 'priests', I have found out the hard way that it is best to steer clear of chldren apart from those of your own. Mine are grown, so that means for me, all children.
Here is a rhymed record of an event that happened to me at Easton Towne Center in Columbus, Ohio.
I saw children playing in a fountain today. The sun was bright and the leaves were green. There was a sweet cheerfulness in the air. I thought – why not record the idyllic scene?
So with careful aim, I clicked a frame To include the mothers sitting all around. It was a scene to warm one’s heart, But the mothers looked on me and frowned.
You see, I am a man, and I’m not allowed To share what women and children share; It was assumed I intended harm, And I was subjected to humiliation’s glare.
Tainted with bitterness, I left that scene; Never to return there again – Ever again! I wonder, do little boys see their future In the ugly and despised world of men?
I was a stupid and naive fool just playing tourist, and the next thing I know, I'm surrounded by three cops and humiliated in a public square.
If watching children dressed in bathing suits and playing in a fountain in a public place is bad, I'm hard pressed to know why they were there in the first place.
quote: There was a time when I might have refered to such a young one as "young man", and in any conversation, I might have smiled and said things in an effort to afford him dignity... perhaps even saying "sir" to him in such a way as to let him know that this is how civilized men talk to each other.
The bad thing with that is many kids see that as patronizing them. Like when Auntie coos, "You're such a handsome young man in your new sweater!", "young man" becomes associated with being talked down to or babied, so it really implies the opposite of the actual words. Most kids don't take being called "sir" or "miss" seriously, either. It just doesn't fit in anymore, at least not in current American culture. So when you say "sir", you end up with a five year-old raising his eyebrow at you or giggling.
Or screaming "Stranger!" and kicking you in the shin. Posts: 973 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Oddly enough, though, in referring to Jesus during his mortal ministry, I would find it hideously disrespectful to speak of him as "Mr. Jesus." So the Mr. thing doesn't ALWAYS convey respect.
This is interesting; I would agree with the assessment of disrespect, but I'm not sure why.
Jesus is a first name, right? Is "Mr. Christ" any better? ("Mr Josephson", perhaps? But it's not clear who you're talking about, then.) Conversely, would "Mr. Orson" convey disrespect? How about Julius Caesar, more-or-less a contemporary of Jesus; could one refer to him as "Mr. Caesar"? "Mr. Julius"? It rings wrong, but not with quite the same amount of disrespect, oddly enough. How about some other titles - "Comrade Jesus"? That works much better. "Dr Jesus"? Sounds like someone trying to sell you faith healing. "Sir Jesus"? Ridiculous. "The Right Honourable Jesus, Bt, OBE"? I'm shading into farce now.
Hmm. I'm not sure what I think about this. Why do respectful titles sound odd when applied to historical people? And the egalitarian "Comrade" works well at least for Jesus.
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quote:Even so, by the fourth year I was there, we had smaller, more personal classes, and i've always found it weird to call someone Mr. / Professor X when they're calling you by your first name.
At my Israeli university right now I seem to totally avoid calling them anything in class, and WRITE to them as "Dear Professor X".
--lonelywalker
quote:When I was in college, my father used to become irate when he would hear my friends and I talking about classes and saying things like "I have Sellers for math" or "I have Johnson for British lit." He saw it as a sign of disrespect not to include some kind of title before the last name. Obviously, we would never have addressed these people simply by their last names. It was more a function of reading the names as they were written on our schedules. Dad was pretty hardcore about titles and respect.
--DPerry
I agree with points from both of these previous posts.
My mom works at the school that I got to, so she is good friends with a lot of the teachers. Three in particular come to mind. When I was little, I knew these people by their first names-- Debbie, Becky - and my mom was even such good friends with one that she became known to my brother and I as "Aunt Kathryn".
Well, when I got in to 8th grade, all of a sudden "Debbie" became "Ms. Crowson". Instinct told me to call her Debbie, because Ms. Crowson seemed so formal for a person I knew so well. That led me to do like lonelywalker does--now by habit I almost never call my teachers ANYTHING in class. It works for me, because I am what you might call a 'teacher's pet' and I never end up frantically waving my hands yelling out a teacher's name.
When I got to high school, "Becky" became "Mrs. Elley" and "Aunt Kathryn" became "Mrs. McCormack". Habit forces me not to use ANY name for these people when speaking, so it seems awkward to talk about them with my mom--I never know if I should be casual or formal. I don't have a problem with my friends--I always use either Mr./Mrs. or just the last name.
Which brings me to DPerry's quote. I tend to refer to teachers by just a last name too--"Hey, I'm headed to Frazee's!" or "What class do you have after Devlin?"
In my mind, I'm simply referring to the teacherby name to someone else, not directly to them. I don't feel as if I am disrespecting the teacher...it is just easier. Plus, in the school I attend class sizes are extremely small (only 285 in our entire HS), so teachers and students are clearly more bonded and closer.
It helps when the teacher is also a coach. For some reason "Coach Buthod" sounds so much nicer-- or maybe I mean less forced-- than "Mr. Buthod" does.
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