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Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

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Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#191

Post by Joblo62 »

whycome wrote: post #165
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Quebec French seems to be in the process of dropping the formal. It’s way less common there than metro/france French.

This so untrue I had to make an account to reply to you.

Quebec french is standardised by the OQLF (Office Québécois de la Langue Française) and the formal/informal distinction is as important in our french as it is in other cultures. The reason it might seem less common is because most conversations people have are informal. In formal settings, it is still expected of people to use "vous" rather than "tu". It is seen as polite and some people might even take offence to the informal being used when they do not know their interlocutor personally.

I don't know where you got that from.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#192

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

FromTheSteppe wrote: post #158
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is speaking to someone formally considered ending up in an inferior position in all cultures? In Persian if someone expects to be spoken with formally, they have to speak formally themselves. So when you speak formally you're kinda bringing both parties up. You can even flirt by speaking formally.

In Spanish asymmetric conversations have always been a thing, e.g. student-teacher, patient-doctor or younger-older conversations where the former side uses V and the latter T.

The V is gradually being dropped in Spain and in the last few decades the process seems to have accelerated, though, definitely it seems faster than in French (although I don't know that much about French). I don't think my 4-year-old son will have much use for the V in his life. And like your parent comment, I also think that's probably for the best in our case, although it does sound like it's probably different in Persian.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#193

Post by F3nd0 »

softfalcon wrote: post #151
mytailorisrich wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

English became the dominant business language for reasons unrelated to the English language itself but because of the relative power of the people who spoke the language.

Yeah, I feel like people forget about that whole British Imperialism thing too easily. We all speak English because at one point the English practically owned the entire planet.

Compare English with Esperanto, which, in spite of being much easier to learn than English, still hasn't become anywhere near as widespread (at least in terms of number of speakers).

Ironically the one biggest thing which presents an ideological advantage for Esperanto is that it's native to no nation, so all the people who speak it are closer to being equals in that regard; yet it is the imperialism and a large number of native speakers which has helped to make English so prevalent. So just being technically and morally superior doesn't win you adoption by a long shot, even if you try.

And it may be of note for this post that the original author of Esperanto was very conscious of this whole formal/informal issue, which is why he opted to introduce only the plural second person pronoun into practice.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#194

Post by pySSK »

blowski wrote: post #162
FromTheSteppe wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is speaking to someone formally considered ending up in an inferior position in all cultures? In Persian if someone expects to be spoken with formally, they have to speak formally themselves. So when you speak formally you're kinda bringing both parties up. You can even flirt by speaking formally.

How does the “flirting by speaking formally” work? “I say, does Madam visit this establishment frequently”.

It’s a nice gesture kinda like holding the door open for you date.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#195

Post by elboru »

FromTheSteppe wrote: post #158
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is speaking to someone formally considered ending up in an inferior position in all cultures? In Persian if someone expects to be spoken with formally, they have to speak formally themselves. So when you speak formally you're kinda bringing both parties up. You can even flirt by speaking formally.

Not in mine. But you surely build a barrier of “respect”, I learned that early in my career. I was too formal and “too respectful”, that built a barrier with many people, a barrier other teammates didn’t have. That barrier can be useful though, but you need to be aware of it.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#196

Post by MrsPeaches »

k__ wrote: post #6

In German, we use "sie" the German equivalent of "they". Thus, to be polite, you address someone as many people that aren't part of the conversation.

Some fun archaic ones on German[1]

Interesting to see the use of “Er” as a put down.

[1] https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Höflichkeitsform

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#197

Post by jon_richards »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #187

Huh, so there is precedent for the singular “they.”

I’d hardly say this is “precedent” for something that’s been done since the beginning of the language. (The Canterbury Tales are generally considered the threshold between old and modern English and they use singular “they”.)

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#198

Post by denton-scratch »

mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote: post #177
bdw5204 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't so much that they're mainly found in religious texts as that the most common English translation of the Bible is still the King James Version which is over 400 years old and "thou" was still part of the English language back then. The other other English text most people are familiar with that is older than the KJV would be the works of Shakespeare which arguably need to be translated to modern English at th…

To be fair though, Beowulf in its original form would be incomprehensible even to well read native English speakers. Old English and Modern English are so different that they're no longer mutually intelligible even. Same goes for a lot of languages if you compare them to themselves a millennium apart. Or if their common ancestor was milennia ago. E.g Icelandic and Faroese aren't really mutually intelligible with Norw…

/me native brit

I was raised with the KJV and Shakespeare. To me, that language is definitely "modern english"; it doesn't need translating, any more than Scouse needs translating.

I have a completely different relationship with Chaucer. But it's like reading a foreign language that I know, but not idiomatically; I can't be sure whether X is supposed to be sarcastic, or Y is meant to be as funny as it seems.

Beowulf is some thing else again. That definitely seems to me like a foreign language.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#200

Post by Tommstein »

Joblo62 wrote: post #191
whycome wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quebec French seems to be in the process of dropping the formal. It’s way less common there than metro/france French.

This so untrue I had to make an account to reply to you. Quebec french is standardised by the OQLF (Office Québécois de la Langue Française) and the formal/informal distinction is as important in our french as it is in other cultures. The reason it might seem less common is because most conversations people have are informal. In formal settings, it is still expected of people to use "vous" rather than "tu". It is see…

I'm pretty sure they were talking about their impression of trends regarding how people actually talk, not how some literal language lawyers demand they speak. Whether they're actually correct or not, I have no idea and it's beside the point.
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