the informality of English

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

If you are an anglophone, and you learn a foreign language, you rapidly discover that they have a formal way of saying "You" and an informal way, you know tu and vous, du and sie, and many others. English alone seems to have only one way to say "You".

I always find the formal-informal split of other languages annoying and worrisome, but I wonder, do none anglophones find English strangely casual in the way it does not have an obvious difference between the two?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:21 (nineteen years ago)

On the contray, Finnish people I worked with found English annoying formal - sorry this, sorry that/ please can I blah blah/ Dear Mr. Blah/ Yours Sincerely etc etc

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:25 (nineteen years ago)

Actually we don't have an informal second person pronoun.

We used to have 'thou' as opposed to 'you' but years of speaking a Saxon/Danish/Norman pidgin incline us towards simplification.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:28 (nineteen years ago)

Brazilian Portuguese has no formal/informal distinction, it's all "voce".

― Revivalist (Revivalist), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:33 (nineteen years ago)

I lived in Italy for three years and never really got to grips with the formal/informal thing, especially as in Italian to avoid using the informal 'tu' you use 'Lei' which means 'she'. So shopkeepers would say to me 'What would she like?' (meaning me, and I'm not even female) and I always felt this was a bit weird. I found Italian very formal in other ways too - there's much greater use of titles when you speak to people (not just things like 'Mister', but addressing graduates as 'Doctor' or 'Engineer').

Italians said that they found English formal in different ways, as Dadaismus suggested. So whereas they would be very direct in shops / restuarants / cafes etc. ("Give me a coffee") English speakers tend to wrap everything up in polite langauge ("Sorry, excuse me, I was wondering whether you'd mind awfully giving me a coffee, if it's not too much bother").

― Teh HoBBercraft (the pirate king), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:35 (nineteen years ago)

German is amazingly formal... the polite you form actually means "They", like as if they are showing you amazing respect by i) pretending you are several people and ii) not actually talking directly to you.

This is reminding me of the time I was shown great respect in a restaurant by getting my food an hour after everyone else.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:54 (nineteen years ago)

I've heard that in Spanish and/or Basque people don't do the whole please and thank you thing. As in, if you are buying something in a shop, you say "Give me that". The please is irrelevant, as it is the shopkeeper's job to give it to you.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:55 (nineteen years ago)

... that probably explains why my friend who works in a bookstore thinks Spanish and Italian people are rude bastards

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:57 (nineteen years ago)

I don't remember not hearing 'please' and 'thank you' the summer I spent in Barcelona, not the several times I lived in Milan.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 14:59 (nineteen years ago)

Haha. I don't know if I think the "English" approach described up there actually formal or just over-apologetic. Either way, it's not very American, really. Def not in New York, fer shur, but not even the small-town mid-US that I'm accustomed to would take "politeness" that far. Maybe in parts of the South?

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:02 (nineteen years ago)

Aren't Americans are always saying "Excuse me?" and "Pardon me?" and calling each other "Sir" and "Ma'am"?

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:07 (nineteen years ago)

Depends on what region, really.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:10 (nineteen years ago)

xpost: I was exaggerating, but it's essentially true that in Italian people are much more comfortable using imperatives ("Do this!") to people whose job it is to 'do this', whereas in English things are normally couched with a please/could/would/can.

I don't remember not hearing 'please' and 'thank you' the summer I spent in Barcelona, not the several times I lived in Milan.

The words for 'please' aren't used much in Italian, but 'thankyou' is used frequently, along with 'prego' which is a kind of all-purpose 'you're welcome/after you/I'm being polite here' type of word.

― Teh HoBBercraft (the pirate king), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:10 (nineteen years ago)

Weird. I remember hearing per piacere and per favore as often as one would expect.

Prego is 'I pray', and essentially means 'Prithee do not embarrass me with thanks for something I am only too glad to do.'

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:14 (nineteen years ago)

Is the Sie in German, 'they' or 'she'?

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:19 (nineteen years ago)

Yes, in my experience if you say please or thank you in Spain they think you are being facetious and taking the pish.

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:23 (nineteen years ago)

most americans don't say "pardon me"

― timmy tannin (pompous), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:28 (nineteen years ago)

M.: Yes.

It's as if you people have never watched "My Fair Lady". English formal speech is significantly different from informal speech in grammar and vocabulary. Just because we don't really have an informal conjugation anymore hardly makes English "less formal" than other languages. It just means we mark our formality in other ways.

And, you know, compare Japanese.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:31 (nineteen years ago)

American English does not contain this polite "excuse me" expression you're talking about.

We have SKEWZE ME, which one says when one is indignant or exasperated, and translates literally to "are you going to get the fuck out of my way or not, jackass?"; EXCEWOOOOEWZE ... ME, which one says to avoid blame; and ESSCUSE ME?, which one says to communicate that you better watch yourself unless you want a foot up your ass.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:48 (nineteen years ago)

A size 12 in your size 6, so to speak.

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:49 (nineteen years ago)

NB: I have no idea what that means. Someone told me a story about his dad offering to perfom that service for someone else, to curb a public disturbance.

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:51 (nineteen years ago)

Was this person's dad a professional butthole-sizer?

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:51 (nineteen years ago)

I don't remember, I was pretty durnk when the story was told. There are sizes?

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:52 (nineteen years ago)

Maybe it was a size-6 woman whose ass was going to be kicked. It would be a lot less pithy to tell a guy you were going to put a size 12 in his 32/34s.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:54 (nineteen years ago)

Cue joke about who are bigger assholes/trans-pond fite.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:55 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, I think pithiness (not to say, pythyness) is U&K when staring down rednecks in a parking lot.

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:56 (nineteen years ago)

most americans don't say "pardon me"

I have heard Americans say "Pardon me" for the longest time, oftentimes on weekends: professors of Math, sport stars (whether World's champion or just holder of the World's record). In fact it has impacted me so hard that I guess you could say I'm obsessing over it

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 2 June 2006 15:57 (nineteen years ago)

I have a feeling "pardon (me)" is more of an east coast thing...? The people I know who use "pardon?" for "sorry, I didn't hear you just now can you repeat the part about the flower pot again?" are the same people who pronounce "aunt" and "vase" differently from me (and in at least one case were from Boston-area).

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:00 (nineteen years ago)

Aunt is "oftentimes" pronounced weirdly by (some) Americans

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:01 (nineteen years ago)

And I have to admit, it always made me feel like I'd stepped onto the set of the original "Parent Trap". (XP to myself)

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:01 (nineteen years ago)

Americans pretty rarely use "pardon me," I think -- it definitely reads as formal and somehow quaint, in the good way, something that would be said in a black-and-white movie. I say it, and that's probably on purpose, for over-the-top politeness.

Also those children on elementary-school stages following it with "sir may I have some more" and then "oom-pah-pah," etc.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:03 (nineteen years ago)

I'm sorry but I CANNOT read ESSCUSE ME? without hearing it in the voice of a flaaaaaaming Latino drag queen.

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:10 (nineteen years ago)

Oh, did you see Too Wong Foo on cable last night too?

― Allyzay Rofflesbot (allyzay), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:13 (nineteen years ago)

Wow, twelve words, not a one over five letters, and yet I still managed a typo.

― Allyzay Rofflesbot (allyzay), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:14 (nineteen years ago)

I say 'pardon' and 'pardon me', but then I say things like plaît-il?, in French too.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:17 (nineteen years ago)

No, I've NEVER seen To Wong Foo!

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:19 (nineteen years ago)

I say "pardon me" a lot now, but probably I got it from learning to say "pardonnez-moi" instead of "excusez-moi" and then retroactively started saying the same in English even though "excuse me" is more usual.

― dar1a g (daria g), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:24 (nineteen years ago)

So shopkeepers would say to me 'What would she like?' (meaning me, and I'm not even female) and I always felt this was a bit weird.

Maybe they were all gay.

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:44 (nineteen years ago)

You've got to be careful when considering something like this. There is a tendency is to attach significance to features of a foreign language that aren't present in your own simply because they're new to you. It's also a bad idea to draw conclusions about speakers of a language based on a discrete aspect of the language. Such as, say, pronoun forms. For example, the Japanese language doesn't have a singular/plural distinction for nouns like English does, but that doesn't mean they are less concerned with the number of things than we are. They just speak a different language.

I can believe Americans are more informal than other cultures, but I wouldn't try and prove it with the syntax of English. Look to usage.

― fortunate hazel (f. hazel), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:56 (nineteen years ago)

I'm going with 'pardon me' as East Coast polite-standard. Maybe it's jsut my social set. With friends using 'thank you' seems sufficient, but in business and with strangers 'cheers' seems preferable and less intimate. (xp)

― remy (x Jeremy), Friday, 2 June 2006 16:59 (nineteen years ago)

Genius :-)

Maybe they were all gay.

That would be quite some coincidence.

― Teh HoBBercraft (the pirate king), Friday, 2 June 2006 17:36 (nineteen years ago)

I remember a Spanish lady banging on the counter because I couldn't speak Spanish. As though banging on glass would suddenly make me understand her. Actually I did understand her but I couldn't reply in her language. Rude bitch. Most Spanish people seem very rude. As opposed to the Japanese. Think English is formal, try Japanese.

― Nathalie (stevie nixed), Friday, 2 June 2006 17:58 (nineteen years ago)

English speakers tend to wrap everything up in polite langauge ("Sorry, excuse me, I was wondering whether you'd mind awfully giving me a coffee, if it's not too much bother").

Hmmm, I had noticed that the native spanish speakers rarely say please at my DunkinDonuts

― Courtney Gidts (ex machina), Friday, 2 June 2006 18:09 (nineteen years ago)

japanese don't say thank you to shopkeepers. rude, rude, rude bastards

― Good Dog (Good Dog), Saturday, 3 June 2006 01:54 (nineteen years ago)

I have no special insight to add, but would just like to state that this is already a really fascinating thread.

― fields of salmon (fieldsofsalmon), Saturday, 3 June 2006 01:59 (nineteen years ago)

Is the Sie in German, 'they' or 'she'?

It's "they". Sie means both "they" and "she", but when using the form of politeness one uses the third person plural form of the verb. So:

Mochten Sie duschen mit mir? (polite)

as opposed to

Mochtet sie duschen mit mir? (neutral - 'she')

Mochtest du duschen mit mir? (impolite)

― DV (dirtyvicar), Sunday, 4 June 2006 09:22 (nineteen years ago)

try cantonese more.

my mum took the piss out of me because at a shop i said the cantonese equivalent of "can i please top up this card" to the shop keeper, as opposed to "top up" and give them the card. lol.

― ken c (ken c), Sunday, 4 June 2006 09:31 (nineteen years ago)

Jesus, I really fucked up the word order in my German examples.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Sunday, 4 June 2006 10:52 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah the Germans have to wait until the end of the sentence to find out what you wanna do with them.....

― JTS (JTS), Sunday, 4 June 2006 12:28 (nineteen years ago)

Warum ein Duschensack bist du?

― M. White (Miguelito), Sunday, 4 June 2006 20:09 (nineteen years ago)

japanese don't say thank you to shopkeepers. rude, rude, rude bastards

Who told you that???

― Super Cub (Debito), Sunday, 4 June 2006 20:52 (nineteen years ago)

formal and informal yous can be hard to navigate! i'm living with a host family in russia, and here's how it's going:

i call the parents and other middle-aged and elderly relatives formal you. the 24 year old son and his 19 year old wife, who live with the parents, are also formal you. however, the 19 year old daughter and her 26 year old husband, who live separately, are informal you, as is a cousin of 18-20 years, because they're more comfortable with it. so it's a little weird when all the younger people are together and i speak to some of them formally and some of them more informally.

also, last night we had dinner with the director of the study abroad program. i called the director informal you, but the host parents, who are formal you to me, called the director informal you.

in conclusion, i find it confusing and weird.

― Maria (Maria), Monday, 5 June 2006 08:37 (nineteen years ago)

er. correction. the host parents called the director formal you. and that's why it was weird.

― Maria (Maria), Monday, 5 June 2006 08:38 (nineteen years ago)

Is it true that Russian has an incredibly informal you, that you would only use when talking to animals, inanimate objects, or people you want to insult? This was implied by a section in Orlando Figes' book about the Russian Revolution, in which he discusses the extreme rudeness of the Tsarist army's officers.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Monday, 5 June 2006 09:26 (nineteen years ago)

In Scottish, the singular and plural second persons remain distinct, i.e. for tu and vous, read "you" and "youse."

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 5 June 2006 09:28 (nineteen years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.