ma'am, do you think?

[emei]

Question for you English-speaking folks! In things I've been reading or watching lately, I keep realising that these fictional people don't use names the way I do.
I've been pondering titles and honorifics especially. Do you have thoughts on them? Do you actually use them in everyday life, adressing of thinking of people as Mr/Mrs So-and-so? What

Comments

[quietliban]

Here, we call school teachers "Ms/Mrs/Mr Surname" unless they have a nickname that is uh, suitable for them to hear eg. Mr Brown = Brownie or Mrs McAllister = Macca. University lecturers it's generally firstname basis even if they have qualifications that entitle them to Dr or Professor or whatever, unless it is in a formal setting and introduction then titles are used (eg. a speech or talk).

The rest of the time it is usually firstname basis.

Men and boys seem to call people by their lastname and I only noticed it in high school. Some of the girls were called by the lastname at the girls school I worked at but generally that happened when they had a common firstname. Actually, now that I think about it-- it was the same thing with the boys at my school (we had a lot of Michaels and Matthews). Also, it's more acceptable for a girl to call a boy by their lastname only than a boy to call a girl by their lastname only (I have no idea why that is...). And sometimes (more usually with girls) getting called by the lastname only actually represents more familiarity ie. it's something they can get a way with because they know each other well.

Full names are used to imply formality and a little bit of distance. I rarely ever use my full name (Jessica) and prefer to be called Jess at all times but managers and supervisors often switch between calling me that my full name when they want to have a bit more authority. My parents rarely call me by my full name either (but get upset when people don't use it in formal situations...I don't know why).

[emei]

Interesting! It sounds like Australia is more informal and on a first name basis, compared to how people describe the UK and US. Sounds much more familiar to me, as a way of thinking.

I've noticed that same trend of boys/men being called by last name only much more often than girls - I guess all sorts of things tie into the reasons for it. Partly that lastnames only seems a military tradition, and patriarchal family structures where the men are supposed to carry the family name...

Nicknames/shortened names vs. full names is interesting too. Going by shortened names seems more widely spread in English-speaking places. To me, most shortened names or nicknames are very informal and for friends only, except for some very common ones.