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[akissinacrisis]

I. Swear. To. God.

If I read one more fic in which Arthur gives Harry some kind of talk - be it the "make sure my daughter is home by eleven" kind or the "Harry you do know what sex is, don't you?" kind or the "if you take my pure darling's virginity without promising her that you will marry her I will shoot you" kind - something is going to die. I

Comments

[akissinacrisis]

H'okay. *deep breath*

1. I think that the rule of thumb with "sir" is to steer clear of using it outside of a prefessional capacity - basically, only use it in situations where it is explicitly OK to use it. So, addressing your senior in the police force = yes; adressing the teacher you can't be bothered to say the name of = yes; addressing the man you have stopped for speeding if you are a (polite) policeman / the person you are serving if you a (good) waiter = yes; addressing your father/uncle/father-in-law like that = no. I would hazard a guess that in the Auror department it's probably acceptable, maybe even expected, particularly from newbies.

Any situations in which it is not expected, it wouldn't be done, basically because it looks sarcastic - from my eyes, I always read these "yes, sir" scenes of Harry/Ron/Draco as if they're taking the piss, and there should be a mock-salute at the end. Also, it is one of the few really glaring Americanisms that makes alarm bells ring in my head in an unpleasant manner. I also always expect Arthur to follow the conversation by making "subtle" remarks about the gun he keeps for occasions like this, and then to abruptly change the topic to baseball.

I could, perhaps, see Harry using it to address a frail old man that he feels deserves respect, and that he's started a sentence to which a requires a name, but who he's forgotten the name of ... but he would do it awkwardly, aware all the time of how overly-sincere he sounds.

2. "Ma'am" is harder. You'll notice that the male teachers are called "sir" as a replacement for their names, but McGonagall is only ever called "Professor" or "Professor McGonagall". It's just even more not-done. Apart from if you're the Queen. I would guess that maybe somewhere professional where the men in authority are called "sir" you could get away with it - if Tonks was your Head Auror, maybe? But I admit that I'm out of my depth here. :/

3. So what do we say instead? Names, usually. Otherwise, the oh-so-efficient method of "oh, er, sorry, I didn't quite catch your ... er, could you repeat ...?"

4. In letters where you don't know the name of the person you're writing to, it's "Dear Sir or Madam". :)

5. What I was really whinging about was the mentality behind it ... it's just too ... Basically, I've found that while this is a stereotype, it's a stereotype that generally rings true: that the English use irony all the time. We never take anything seriously, we always understate anything that happens, we're always taking the piss and turning everything into a joke. Hence, sincerity makes us very awkward, and earnestness is heavily frowned upon.

6. Just for the record: I cannot stress enough how weird it is to read Harry saying "sir" or "ma'am" in any of these contexts. It's like him putting on a cowboy hat. It leaves me in a state of WHAT? WHAT?

Hope this mini-essay helped. :/

Sorry for the length, but I felt a bit awkward with what was supposed to be a private rant suddenly in the otp, and felt that I should try and be helpful rather than whingy, I'm not a complete ranty bitch STRIKEmost of the time, I swear.

[only_for_one]

You did help, thank you very much! I try to be as close to true English as I can, but my Americanisms do get in the way at times :/ Sorry if I jumped into your private rant, I can certainly see how it would have been odd to find it in the otp.

[akissinacrisis]

I admire you all, I really do. Sometimes I'm very glad I'm British ... my writing in an American fandom wouldn't bear thinking about. :/// A good comm is hp_britglish, if you're interested. :)

[kerosinkanister]

Via obhwf_weekly.

addressing your father/uncle/father-in-law like that = no

That reminded me of when a Texas friend met the mum of a friend from New Zealand. Like almost any boy from Texas would he called her "ma'am." And of course she thought he was taking the piss!

Anyway, interesting post. Harry and Arthur do have a bit of a strange relationship. Obviously it's not fleshed out very much. But Molly is obviously a maternal figure for Harry where Arthur is definitely not a paternal figure. I don't think I've ever really seen their relationship explored in fic but it could be interesting. I don't see them ever being particularly close, unlike with Molly, not that they don't get on well.

[excitedrainbow]

Correctamundo!

I IS AGREEING WITH EVERYTHING.

Understatement and irony FTW.