One of the few non-science, non-heathen websites that I follow is Amy Alkon’s “The Advice Goddess Blog.” Described as “Miss Manners with fangs,” Amy has a no-nonsense and hardnosed approach to manners. She pulls no punches, as in her relentless campaign to get people to stop talking loudly on their cellphones in public places (a stand with which I happen to agree). She’s also anti-PC in a refreshing way, and funny as hell. Granted, she has a small d*g, but she also has a pink Nash Rambler and is an atheist as well as a strong advocate of free speech.
The other day on her Facebook page, she asked her “friends” to give advice about manners to college students. As a prof, all I could do (along with several other teachers) was to tell her what incivilities among our students irked us the most in the classroom. She decided to turn that into a column, and it just appeared in the New York Observer, “College students must major in manners.”
Professor Ceiling Cat contributed some advice, though not to this bit; but I assent strongly!:
Emailing your professor: Use of “u,” “ur” and “n stuf ” is fine if you are 12 and emailing your BFF. When corresponding with your professor, take that extra millisecond to tap out the “yo” before the “u.” (How much time do you really save by typing “how u bin?”)
Start your email off with a salutation—“Dr.” or “Professor” or whatever professional title they’ve told the class they prefer—as opposed to “Hey.”
If you are asking to meet with them, propose a few times and look up the location of their office in the campus directory instead of asking them to write out directions. Chances are, they didn’t slave away getting a Ph.D. because all the jobs for mall information officers were taken.
These may seem like minor points, but they are not unimportant. It’s through small gestures of consideration like these—taking care not to needlessly suck the professor’s time and energy—that you show respect.
I can’t tell you the number of emails I’ve gotten from students that start with “hey.” My mesentery always contracts when I get that, but of course I always reply politely. And here’s one bit of manners that I’ve witnessed exactly twice in my thirty years of teaching:
Gratitude is good: “Send a thank you card when you graduate; we really appreciate this and can use it for promotion and tenure,” says Dominican College assistant professor Sarah Strout. Better yet, don’t wait till you graduate to express gratitude. Research by social psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky and others finds that being grateful—taking note of what is good in your day and in your life—is one of the most effective ways to make yourself meaningfully happier, and it has cascading benefits for others in your life.
Granted, a fair few students have come to me or written many years after a course to thank me, but it’s nice to hear a few kind words at the end of a quarter’s class. And that goes for anyone who helps you! I’m told that airline flight attendants, who bust their hump attending to thankless and often rude passengers, rarely receive any gratitude at the end of a flight. Really, it makes peoples’ day to show some appreciation.
At any rate, Amy has a new book that came out June 3, and I’m not at all surprised at the title: (click the image for the Amazon link):
As someone who teaches, I love this. 🙂
Love the cover, and title, too. As a recently retired high school (and sometime jr college) teacher, it warms my heart when former students come up to me in public and say hello, as happened yesterday in a crowded lunch joint, where I was sitting with two friends. The “kid” was 33 and now very successful in finance. He didn’t have to bother, but he did, and was very complimentary to his former Math teacher. I’ve had a number of students come up to me late at night in Union Station in downtown Toronto, too. Always very polite (weren’t always so polite back in the day…)
“Always very polite (weren’t always so polite back in the day…)”
A few years ago I encountered a gentlemen in his 20’s with whom I discussed this and that in public education. He said he had recently gone back to his high school and apologized to several teachers whom he had caused significant grief.
It warmed my heart to hear that, though from my own teaching experience, I subjectively perceived that he surely knew then what he was doing and saying.
On the other hand, perhaps it was a deterministic thing and therefore he couldn’t help but give his teachers grief.
And there’s that research too on adolescent pre-frontal lobe development, eh? Perhaps during the several post-high school years lobe development continued/completed and, as a consequence he couldn’t help but (deterministically and not by free will 😉 ) be compelled to apologize to his teachers? Whether that’s so or not, it doesn’t mean others (with the exception of teachers, eh?) HAVE to put up with it.
A friend I went to high school & university with said to me once, speaking of how we all were at that age, “why didn’t someone kill us?”
‘cos they hadn’t found out your dark secret vis-a-vis toilet rolls at that stage?
Yeah I was still in (water) closet about that back then.
Speaking of tp rolls, when I was sharing a house in Moab, Utah about 3 weeks ago with 8 female friends from high school, one of them replaced the roll in one of the bathrooms a la Diana. I looked around, and no Diana there. I asked around, and my friend Carla fessed up to installing it that way, and then we did a poll and there were 6 for over, Carla for under, and 2 who, like the honey badger, didn’t give a shit…
Who hoo for the 2!
Check out the fork on the cover…
Thanks for pointing that out!
Yes! I didn’t notice it at first either. 🙂
I have seen ones you can buy online. Makes a great gift?
I have sent this along to a couple of administrators for consideration to include in new student orientation 🙂 Over the years I have developed some nice snarky replies to some of the stupid questions, and will definitely have to remember the one about weeping for the absent student!!
Oh luxury!
Students today have it good. I always had to hunt down my professors during their office hours. I never used email (but it wasn’t used much back in the dark ages, when I went to school). Usually, I forgot what their office hours were & had to schlep my sorry ass to their office just to find what they were (since they were usually posted).
I loved, “Chances are, they didn’t slave away getting a Ph.D. because all the jobs for mall information officers were taken.”
😀
I too liked that one! Also, being old school, but having such a long last name, I allow the students to address me as Dr. S. which saves them the probability of butchering the pronunciation 🙂
Having suffered through service jobs that dealt heavily with the public (sometimes being threatened and believing my life was in danger), I always go out of my way to be nice to people in similar jobs and if I feel someone has done a truly outstanding job, I make sure to let their bosses know. Honestly, people in the service industry take a lot of crap from being called various names, being told to “smile” (this is just for women) and being threatened. It makes a huge difference to their day when people are nice to them.
Reminds me of this:
http://www.npr.org/2005/05/16/4651531/be-cool-to-the-pizza-dude
Now I’m curious! Threatened? What in the blank type of service were you doing?
Funnily enough working in a campground and the gate into the park. People had to pay $5 to get into the park and they thought it should be free so they would call me all sorts of things. One family came back and wrote down my licence plate trying to intimidate me because they thought I should let them in for free because the wife was pregnant. I was called a c*nt regularly as well while people sped off and turned around.
When I worked in the camp ground, I was often by myself at night (I was a small girl in my 20s) and one night a real weirdo came in. He threatened everybody, including his neighbours, the guy at the concession stand and for some reason I escaped his threats but I was really afraid that night. I think the cops escorted that guy out.
Other rude things I remember is mostly jerks from the south (a lot of Texans) telling me Canada was stupid, they didn’t like the tax, they didn’t like the licence plate, the money was wrong, etc. But one guy was a real ass. He kept driving in the grass and tore it all up. I told him to stop parking where he was parking (on the grass) and he told me that he “buy me”. The best was my boss came down and told me to get in his truck then yelled at the guy. He didn’t expect it because he just assumed that I was there to abuse and my boss would make nice with him. He moved his truck right away. I loved it when my boss did that but it was pretty pathetic that it took that kind of large male force (my boss was a big guy) to get these assholes to do anything and these jerks felt they had the right to treat me like garbage because I was a young girl.
I once had to fire a guy, who immediately went to my boss with a “man-to-man” appeal against being fired by a broad. That’s when he found out my boss had actually talked me into it. (I was big on second chances.)
Campground? Park? I was expecting a story with prisoners, human trafficking or at least a bit of Pablo Escobar! Now I have to find something to watch on television 😛
Diana: I always do my best to do the same (even though I’ve never had a job like this). To give is better than to receive and it makes you feel better.
I was traveling once on Christmas Eve with my family and (in northern latitudes) is was a dark long night of driving. We were hungry and needed to eat and NOTHING was open. We finally found a Subway (chain) sandwich shop, where there were two tired African American young people manning the fort. I gave them $20 for just being open and serving us (after paying for the food; this is a non-tipping kind of place if you don’t know the chain). I was so grateful for the service (and the food). And I know I made their month — and maybe made it worthwhile to have to work Christmas Eve!
I remember defending people being bullied by jerk guys. Both were young girls working in the food industry. I hate that crap. They can’t do anything because they could be fired so I try to stand up for them.
I once gave the cleaning guy 20 bucks on my way out after I could’nt hold my liquer in a restaurant’s toilet. :*o
In everyday life I always greet and thank the people with the more thankless jobs in our society.
(That said, I also thank more well-heeled people. 😉 )
My daughter is a 2nd year GTA and recently complained to me about this very thing. After receiving rudely informal emails she took class time to instruct students in proper email etiquette. This year she has again noticed freshmen emitting an odor of undeserved entitlement and familiarity which seems to correspond with their maturity level, but surprisingly she has observed this same attitude and behavior from several 1st year GTAs.
This batch seem to expect everything to be done for them. They couldn’t be bothered to pay attention at meetings, read the material,
or respect the opportunity they have or the professors that run the program.
She has walked into her shared office to find the lights off while occupied because the florescent lighting caused too much anxiety.
There were butt cheeks (replica) on the door and when removed put back on the fridge. Mind you, this is an office that regularly receives students that come to meet with instructors.
It is not the professional atmosphere that a university should put forth.
Maybe it’s a millennial generational thing.
Millennial generational thang is not an excuse.Now get off my lawn.
No, I’ve never seen the “lawn” movie. Gran Torino, I think, but I’m not sure.
I stress to my trainees to be very formal in their emails, because they’re typically talking to dozens of nationalities who they don’t know, and dull formality is an insurance against misunderstanding.
Do see Gran Torino — it’s an excellent movie.
Again. One day I will have to work with these people. Ugh.
“This year she has again noticed freshmen emitting an odor of undeserved entitlement . . . .”
It’s (also) the odor of Amuricun Ecksepshunulism.
same in Canuckistan
I love the title of this book.
I teach at the Tokyo University of Science in the summer and at jr. high for most of the year. As an American I have to say that the respect given towards teachers in Japan (especially at jr. high level), is much much higher.
The language itself has a lot to do with it because there are specific verb endings used when talking to someone older or higher ranked than you. I sometimes hear teachers grilling students who don’t use the “respectful” verb ending. Students wouldn’t dare start an email with the equivalent of ‘hey.’
I sometimes interact with colleagues in Japan (as do many of my local US colleagues). We ALWAYS use the colleague-san form of address. Extremely rude not to — even if you are a gaijin.
Hi, Prof Ceiling Cat ,
How do you feel about informality in submissions to this notablog? In particular, I try to remember to lead Subject lines with “[WEIT] …” so you can prioritise at a glance. Is this useful, or are there too many individual variations for it to be effective?
Is this suitable for Da Roolz, or at least, Da Recommendations?
Oh, and it is 97 subscribers to go to the (first) Big 3-0. Party?
I tend to be brief as possible in order to take up as little of PCC’s limited time as possible.
Sometimes I worry that I’m being too brusque.
“in order to take up as little of PCC’s limited time as possible”
My number 1 concern as well.
It’s not important about subject lines, UNLESS someone says, “You should post this.” (But they never do, though they sometimes apply pressure in the body of the email!)
Indeed, it does appear that she did/didn’t/does again have a little Nash. Cool!
Love it! She has a way with words.
Love her description of the Taurus – ‘all the personality of a bar code’.
great story!
When we address you in the comments or in our emails simply as “Jerry” , are you ok with that? I actually feel a bit uncomfortable doing so!
Yes, I prefer Jerry (or even Professor Ceiling Cat), but NEVER “Coyne”!
What about the acronym PCC? That’s what I usually do, but it is lazy, I know.
What horrifies me the most is seeing the utter disrespect that so many customers give to people that serve them. Service people are trained to absorb a lot of punishment, and customers seem to take that as permission to dish it out, a chance to be king for a few moments.
There really is an art to being a good customer, just as there is an art to treating customers well.
I will also add that disrespect towards one’s children is another aggravation. That isn’t necessary in order to control or discipline them. A quote I read once regarding this: “Childhood isn’t merely preparation for life, it IS life.”
Oh, I agree!
I also hate it when other people automatically disrespect children, as in lecturing them in advance about what not to do on a field trip, for instance. (There are nicer ways to say anything that needs to be said.)
Yes but. My wife is a teacher and her grades (1 and 2) need very frequent reminders of what is and is not “expected behavior”.
They are EXTREMELY limited in what they can do to control disruptive kids. Stating clear guidelines does help.
Sigh, I suppose so. I remember chaperoning field trips during which I was astounded at the barbarity of some of the kids. So were my kids. 😉
I have substitute taught K-12. I had occasion to help chaperone a group of middle schoolers to a high-quality science museum. Some students can’t rest their voices if their lives depended on it. (Ah, but they have the Insufficiently-Developed Pre-Frontal Lobes excuse, though few if any know of it.) I definitely could tell when the tour guide shifted her modus operandi from responsible adult to disrespectful adolescent lout.
Many times, people told me I was “paid to take the licks”. Yeah sure, like minimum wage would be enough for abuse. And this was usually in response to what I could do to help them. They never wanted the issue resolved, they just wanted to yell at someone.
“They never wanted the issue resolved, they just wanted to yell at someone.”
Yeah, the blamers. Having grown up with a blamer for a parent, I tend to be very careful how I try to correct a service flaw. I try not to comment on what was done or not done, but rather say what I would like to have happen. Making someone feel guilty isn’t the best way to ensure happy service.
I know of a parent who was laying into a cell phone customer rep in a quite pointed, borderline ad hominem, way, to the point the rep specifically inquired for her justification for talking to the rep, personally, that way. The parent responded to the effect that the rep was the one she was able to get to talk to. (Re: Diana McP’s “paid to take the licks” comment.)
Don’t you know experienced reps dealing with customers over the phone appreciate and acknowledge, and are not surprised/shocked by, the reality of dealing with rude customers. Accordingly, it would take quite significantly rude customer invective to prompt such a response from a rep.
The company CEO ought to have had to take that customer call, so as to be able to at least make a pretense of earning his “big bucks.”
I remember asking someone “why are you being so aggressive with me?” and it snapped her out of her rage. On normally reasonable people, I found calling out their behaviour quite effective.
An English teacher friend just had a very nice young girl use “shit” four times in her essay on Romeo and Juliet….No concept of formality…
Maybe that could be funny. But they are all cretins when they write like they are 7 years old.
I try to remember to say “Thank You” to anyone that helps me. In particular to service people like the guy re-filling my water glass at a restaurant, or the mailman.
If someone thanks you, do not say “No trouble”, instead say “My pleasure”; it is no more effort and means a lot more.
Practice these two phrases with the people you associate with regularly, and you will notice how nice it feels when they do it.
Yep, and it’s amazing how far you can go in a foreign land just knowing “thank you” “hello” (advanced, “good morning/evening”), “excuse me”, and the numbers from one to three in their language.
Indeed! I’ve proved that to myself in many different languages! 🙂
Absolutely! Expressing gratitude to everyone who helps you, even in the least way, even if they’re paid to do it, is the easiest and most rewarding secular spiritual practice you can perform. “Thank you” or just “Thanks” is the greatest mantra ever conceived. It not only gives something – recognition – to others but does wonders for you. It keeps you awake and alive and makes your life more valuable and worthwhile. And all it requires is that you pay attention.
+100
I distinctly remember where and when I heard someone respond, “My pleasure.” It was at the Martha Washington Inn in Abingdon, VA. Since then I’ve tried to keep that response handy.
iEl gusto es mío!
My dealing with service people, including those answering customer service phones, has improved greatly due to listening to my partner telephone for help.
She calls up with her smiling, welcoming voice. She makes sure to get the person’s name (or work alias), asking the representative to spell it if necessary, and then uses the name in conversation. She explains thoroughly, makes clear what went wrong and what she wants, apologizes for her part in the problem if she had one, and thanks the person for the time and efforts during and at the end of the call.
Nearly all of the service representatives bend over backwards to help. They spend extra time, provide their direct phone lines for follow-up questions, and often reverse late charges, allow returns, etc., or apologize with apparent sincerity if they can’t.
Treating the service representative as a real person and potential collaborator, instead of an obstacle (as I used to do), accomplishes amazing things. Not to mention that it’s polite and the way we really should treat people.
I perceive that if I preface a service provider request with, “At your convenience,” I usually get (at least a somewhat) expedited response, increasing my own customer convenience. I infer that this results because the service provider realizes that I am making a good faith effort to give her/him significant consideration and respect as a human being, not merely as a (“subordinate” – ugh) service provider.
I do find it useful to tell students how to address me and others. I don’t care if they call me Barbara, Dr. _____, or Ms. _____. I got my Ph.D. in my forties, after about 8 years of college teaching, so my ego isn’t wrapped around the title.
(Students do need to learn formal writing though; I’ll change my little talk in the future.)
I do tell students that around the university they should call EVERYONE Dr. unless they’re sure he/she doesn’t have a Ph.D., or they’re told to do otherwise.
I well remember phoning up a young prof years ago. I’d met him once before and was completely outside his university hierarchy, so I called him by his first name.
“That’s DOCTOR _____!” He said.
There being no percentage in any other approach, I apologized. Pretty soon we worked out who I was and why I was calling, and he apologized, but a student’s whole relationship with that person could have been blighted by failing to address him by his title.
(I’ve also learned to identify myself immediately when phoning, after being mistaken for a possible “other woman” by my then boss’s wife.)
The form of address at the University of Chicago is somewhat different. The very first issue of the University of Chicago Weekly, published two weeks before the day the University opened for the first time, said “By mutual agreement between all faculty and officers of the University now on hand, the uniform appellation of ‘Mr.’ has been adopted in mutual intercourse, thus doing away with all doubts and mistakes as to the proper title of any man connected with the institution.” [Of course women faculty were addressed as “Miss” or “Mrs.”; now perhaps as “Ms.”]. I hope that this very useful tradition hasn’t been abandoned.
Yes, that really seems best.
Way back when I had a high school English teacher who referred to us as “Mister” or “Miss” *last name.* He surprised us the very first day of class by taking roll that way–“Mr. Andrews?,” “Miss Brown?,” etc. That turned out to be one of the most well-mannered classes I’ve ever had.
To this day, I hate being referred to as Ms. I just tell people to call me by my first name.
We were called Mr.and Miss in early years of college. I don’t mind Ms: greatly prefer it to Miss or Mrs. I kept my maiden name while I was married so never really was Mrs. Generally don’t mind being called by my first name, except by hotshot young punks trying to sell me something. Hey, I might ask the next jerk trying to sell me duct cleaning to call me Your Ladyship!
I like “Ms.,” hate “Mrs.”
Merilee–LOL!
I am pretty much resigned to students surfing the web, or playing with their phones (quietly) during lecture.
But the little chat groups are still irksome. Sometimes I have to ask the same group to please be quiet every lecture. Until I ‘lose it’ a little. Then they are quiet.
Mark – I put the ‘only one person at a time can talk’ rule in the syllabus. And, if folks don’t comply, I ‘invite’ them to continue their conversations outside the classroom.
‘Twas a time when professors didn’t have to worry with such “classroom/behavior management” issues.
High school has invaded the university.
High School? Perhaps preschool:-(
Date: Sat, 15 Nov 2014 20:46:07 +0000 To: merilee@sympatico.ca
Sad but true, but the good news is that the college students are paying to be there, and I have no qualms about calling them out or inviting them to exit 🙂
I had a 12th grade girl come in late every day in my Data Management class. She’d giggle and play grab-ass with the guy next to her and then ask me to re-explain what I’d just explained. When I took a slightly sarcastic tone with her she had her parents drag ME into the principal’s office. The principal osculated the parents’ backsides…Stuff like this led me to retire earlyish. Most kids were great, though.
Yes, the parental rump osculation is getting truly ridiculous (at least in the US).
My answer would have been: No; pay attention: You are wasting my time and the rest of the class’s time.
Same in Canada. The principals seem to listen to ( and believe ) parents first these days, parents who, of course, are not even witnesses to the incidents. “My little angel would never be rude…”
My Aidido sensei once told me that he cautioned a pupil in his children’s class not to litter the floor with his clothing. Not long after that, the kid’s mother came and accused the teacher of “restricting her son’s creativity”. (The dojo is located in a rather gentrified neigbourhood.)
Argh
Not a carrot to enter (or remain in) the teaching profession.
The other PhD students and I have often talked about this kind of behavior and we differ a lot.
While my colleagues still try to do something about it, I do not care if students play games on their laptops during class or if they sleep. I do not see myself as their caretaker. They are old enough to take care of themselves and everyone is there by his own choice.
I only get pissed when they disturb other students or when the same people afterwards ask me about something trivial that was covered in that class.
And where I can get really unfriendly is when they complain that the exam was too hard.
I’m all for your modus operandi.
(It’s how I’ve operated in over nine years of full-time substitute teaching K-12. At the end of the day substitutes can walk away from the “classroom/behavior management” tomfoolery and not have to take it home with them, at least with one-day or short-term assignments.)
However, from what you’ve said and what I’ve heard elsewhere, I reasonably gather that the high school mindset is more and more infecting the university.
In light of that, just as K-12 teachers’ effectiveness is in part judged by their students’ academic success – and also by administrators’ expectations that teachers actively, personally involve themselves with students so as to facilitate their academic success – haven’t Masters of the Universe university administrators, Fortune 500 corporate tyrants, and omniscient politicos started making noises in the last couple of years about making a similar requirement of professors? So much for adult university student responsibility, eh?
Dear Professor Coyne,
thank you for this wonderful blog and all the effort you put in it.
Best regards
Wunold
🙂 (NOT meant ironically!)
I don’t understand this.
State opinions on how people communicate? Isn’t that to be considered ill-mannered and rude? It isn’t more harmful in traffic than other walking and talking groups just because the group size may be one. And it benefits communication, as most other types of new media.
Besides, it has the good effect (for me, at least) that people who talk with themselves are no longer an annoyance. The common behavior drowns out the odd (sometimes very odd =D) self-talker.
The times I get upset is when people answer phones in silent zones (dedicated compartments in trains, libraries, et cetera). And then I have no qualms over making myself heard and vouch for silence.
I give people a little leeway with respect to cell phones because their reception can be so crappy–generally one can’t talk in a low voice and still be understood on the other end.
Same thing is true of cordless phones…I really miss being able to have “intimate” conversations with friends & family; these days talking via phone is just tiring.
OTOH, there’s nothing like public cell phone conversations to make one realize just how empty, inane, boring, self-serving, obtuse, and godawful annoying most peoples’ drivel seems to be.
If the volume is turned up on a cellphone, it causes the person to speak loudly as well. It’s just how our brains work. I feel self conscious on a phone. I try to go where people don’t hear me because I always think I’m being annoying.
Same here!
Me three
I always leave the group when I HAVE TO take a cell call (rare). I think it’s rude to talk on the phone in a social group.
I try to go where people can’t hear me because it’s my private call…
But in our office, people who are having extremely private calls frequently step out through the smoke stop doors into the stairwell. This is ironic because the acoustics are such that they can be heard several floors up or down by people they don’t know are there. I always resisted the temptation to duck out through the doors for that reason, but it was hard to resist.
A lot of cell phone talkers can’t be bothered to cup their other hand around the mouthpiece so as to more concentrate the sound and therefore not have to talk as loudly (and as an additional benefit, whether intended or not, help keep their precious conversations out of the ears of others). I guess they need the other hand for gesticulating.
(I occasionally think I should start singing, perhaps an opera aria, or loudly declaim part of Hamlet’s soliloquy for the benefit of any loud cell phone talker within earshot. Surely I have as much right to do that as they have to impose their loud talk on me.)
When kids cry in public and start throwing tantrums, I’m totally tempted to start doing the same. It would be the weirdest experience for the child.
Yes, a chorus “Whaahs!” from all adults within earshot of the cranky toddler.
I have, on occasion, added commentary to a loud cell-phone conversation on the train. All to no avail, alas. Once, late at night, the whole train was doing this to a very loud Russian-speaker, including the universal gesture of finger circling ear. The Russian guy was totally oblivious.
Typo ergo sum Merilee
>
I taught at a couple of local colleges as an adjunct and it always meant so much to me when students expressed appreciation or gratitude. One student gave me a handmade friendship bracelet once in lieu of a thank-you card. Others wrote me notes that I had made a difference in their lives. I try to be appreciative of people like restaurant servers and receptionists because people can be such jerks at times, making others’ lives that much more difficult.
Yes, be polite to servers, and TIP WELL!
I was at a regional university and retired in 1997. I didn’t use email at the time. We had many graduates come back to visit, which I took as a good sign. Also many of our graduates were local and I would see them from time to time. Always pleasant. There were a few instances of rudde students, but very few compared to today, it seems.
Completely with you and Amy sir.
One thing I learned a long time ago: No one ever hears their own name or “thank you” often enough.
I try to live by that.
I AM one of the few people who thanks the cabin crew and flight crew (if present) at the end of every flight! I worked in aerospace for many years (including designing the planes, regulating them, and at an operator). I know how hard their job is.
I make a point of thanking my colleagues at work every time they do something good for me (which is many times per day). I thank them specifically in writing (email) and tell them why it was important to me and I cc their boss. It’s amazing how responsive people are when you treat them this way! (And it’s not all cynical at all — I really do feel grateful, and saying thank you makes your own self feel better too!)
When I was in college, I was too young and foolish to be that grateful. But I did personally thank many of my more influential professors.
It’s a Kindergarten rule: Always say thanks!
I agree with all you say about saying thanks, etc., but do think that using someone’s name tooo often can get cloying and annoying, especially from people trying to sell you something who use your name at least once a sentence.
Agreed. I think anyone who’s just asked my name, using it to ‘personalise’ their spiel is so obviously fake, it’s annoying.
(Of course this could be partly because I’m so bad at names, I just chicken out by calling everybody [mumble] )
“Where’re you going and with whom and
What time do you think you’re coming home?
Saying ‘Thank you,’ ‘Please,’ ‘Excuse Me’
Makes you welcome everywhere you roam.”
From “The Mom Song” performed by humorist Anita Renfroe, set to Rossini’s “William Tell Overture,” and easily found on Youtube.
She also has “The Dad Song,” set to the same music, but considerably shorter, and quite “telling.”
And I HATE being called m’am😁
All women hate that!
Except maybe in the US South, where people seem to expect it. The Indian telemarketers all seem to be trained to say M’am about twice per sentence.
Can you provide a specific, positive recommendation for a substitute appellation/salutation? I certainly never want to offend in this regard. Is “Madame” okay to use?
It’s a hassle, isn’t it? A lot of people who have English as a second language have called me, “lady” which I find amusing. They think it’s polite but it’s not really and for that reason, I find it endearing.
I’ve sometimes said “Miss” which is probably not ideal either. I really have no answer.
Madame is fine if pronounced the French way;-)
The same with “Ma-MA” (French), as opposed to what obtains in my native land, the Amuricun Appalachian South’s “MAAAA-Ma,” which drives me up the wall.
French is more ma-mahn. I find some hoity-toity Brits ( at least on Masterpiece Theater) saying Ma-ma’, or, even worse, Mater and Pater. Does anyone actually use the latter two?
Mater and Pater? No chance. I have no idea if relics of the upper crust might do that, but nobody else.
Oh, forgot to say, I always used Mum and Dad which I think is probably the default English usage.
Christopher Buckley wrote a book about his parents entitled (if I correctly recall) “Mum and Pup.”
In at least the Appalachian South, “Mamaw” and “Papaw” are names for grandparents. Sometimes “Grandma” and “Grandpa” used for the other genetic line so as to avoid confusion. Sometimes “Granny” used, but I don’t know that there’s a male equivalent. Perhaps “Grampy”? A school chum referred to one set of grandparents as “Mom” and “Pop.”
Pawpaw can mean papaya.
My Honduran friend’s grandson calls her Oma ( German hubby). One day he came home from pre-school and told her they had been singing about her:
Oma darling, Oma darling, Oma daaaaarling Clementine…
I’d say ‘Ms’ which (if sufficiently slurred) becomes hard to tell from ‘Miss’ thus hopefully covering all bases…