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What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

bbc.com

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Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#51

Post by ButlerianJihad »

toast0 wrote: post #14
stavros wrote: post #2

This is 100% accurate. I've seen someone apologizing for being stepped on (accidentally, of course). It really does mean "we have, unfortunately and inadvertently, crossed paths and must now ward off the evil spirits by acknowledging this".

> I've seen someone apologizing for being stepped on It is really rude to step underneath other people. Or to lay underneath other people. No wonder they appologized.

I was working on my front door and needed to get prone for a few minutes, when of course someone came along and commanded me to move, so I apologized that I couldn't immediately comply, and he fulminated for a while until stepping over my legs, and it wasn't the first time

I had always considered myself considerate and not blocking people and following posted etiquette rules and staying out of the way and being courteous in traffic but it seems the way now is to just follow commands by strangers and accept their abuse because I’m racist/sexist/privileged/trash

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#52

Post by DonHopkins »

RajT88 wrote: post #17

The British have a similarly strange relationship with the word "Brilliant".

Scottish culture is pure dead brilliant!

Tracy Ullman doing Nicola Sturgeon and Mhari Black .... pure dead brilliant!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eV5TbEydy0

Glasgow! Pure Dead Brilliant!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwomQzigGuc

PdB C to PostScript compiler:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29964903

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#53

Post by whackernews »

enochthered wrote: post #9

I’m a Brit. It was only after living overseas that I realised just how mad our use of “sorry” can be. An example. One day I was on the tube. My bag was on the seat next to me. A bloke gets on, points at my bag and says “sorry”. What he actually meant, was “move your bag”. The thing is, if he had said something so direct, I would have said “sorry, what did you say to me?” And on and on…

Was on a London bus early one morning, not many people on the bus. One bloke got up from his seat to get off, he had a big bag and knocked it against one of the poles on his way out. He said sorry to the pole, there was no one else around. One of the most British things I’ve seen.

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#54

Post by getoj »

tdeck wrote: post #37
Izkata wrote: post #15

Isn't this just... normal? Maybe they use it more often, but (also in the Midwest as other comments mention) these uses are all more common than an actual apology. But for a more distant example of the "I'm about to inconvenience you" usage being normal - isn't the Japanese "sumimasen" used almost exactly the same as these?

As a learner it feels like Japanese is full of this kind of formalized, preemptory apologizing in all kinds of situations. You go to the supermarket and ask if they sell stamps (the answer is no) and they say the formal apology "申し訳ありません" (literally: I have no excuse). There's also ごめん下さい "gomen kudasai" (literally "please forgive me") which is used as a greeting when visiting someone's house unexpectedly. And どうもすみま…

> None of these necessarily imply the speaker has actually done something wrong

You’d be surprised. The culture of kidzukai has two core tenets: (1) You must anticipate and cater to the other person’s every need and whim. If you fail you must apologize. (2) You must not allow the other person to do (1) for you instead of you doing it for them. If you fail you must apologize.

This means that every interaction between people who are even slightly close to each other in the social hierarchy is 3D chess which always ends in one or both of you apologizing to the other.

p.s. Gomen kudasai is “please permit me” to enter your house, not really an apology like gomen nasai.

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#55

Post by instalabsai »

mettamage wrote: post #33

As a Dutchie the way I used sorry is along the lines of “I am sorry, I won’t do that again.” Then I had a long relationship with an ethnically Dutch person but culturally a Londoner (she grew up there) and also learned there is “I am sorry for your pain and wish I could take it away” (this implies though they probably would do it again because they are not sorry for their actions). It was maddening at first but now I…

“Sorry” is used almost always passive aggressively in Dutch: “Sorry maar”, “Sorry hoor”, “Sorry zeg”

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#56

Post by dwb »

I think it would illustrate more to expand the abbreviations. In almost all these uses, it’s just a short version of the “obvious” dictionary-definition apology. For example, point two’s “sorry?” is short for “I’m sorry I didn’t hear you, can you please repeat that?”. It puts the blame for the conversational stumble on the listener - whether or not that’s correct - to smooth it over. Point three is short for “I’m sorry to interrupt you or mildly inconvenience you, but could you do this small thing for me, a stranger that you have no obligation to?”. And so on.

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#57

Post by anal_reactor »

TBH I'm way less polite than I used to be. I literally never use "sorry" except "I want to apologize for something wrong I've done and it's a big deal". When I bump into someone I usually just move on without acknowledging the situation. But I also butt in with help without a word - there's a surprising number of children I saved by randomly approaching the parent and offering band-aids without uttering a word.

I think I kind of accepted that I don't have hardware acceleration for pleasantries and I only use them when there's something very clear I can gain from that, like at work. Otherwise I default to "Pass me the salt." like saying a command to a subordinate. "Can you pass me the salt?" is peak politeness for me.

BTW there's a fun story. Back at the university I had some shit course with another faculty, and one of exercises was spotting things on a recording. I mentioned a scene where women in a third-world country were receiving education and said "... because those chicks were getting educated" and one girl got upset "WHAT DID YOU SAY?!" while the other one got sad "nobody has ever called ME a chick!". Of course the interaction wasn't in English so that wasn't the exact word I used, but yeah.

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#58

Post by roarcher »

tdeck wrote: post #45
roarcher wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm American and I've heard Americans say "I beg your pardon", but like you I've always thought of it as a slightly proper (maybe WASP-y) idiom. People frequently say "excuse me", "sorry?", or "say again?". At least I do. Maybe I should get my ears checked.

I'm familiar with the expression but if an American said that to me, I'd probably think it meant "rethink what you just said".

It depends a lot on their tone. Most of the time I've heard it, it's a quick "begpardon?", sometimes with their ear cocked towards you.

When I see it in writing, I too for some reason picture an angry posh British man who is about to demand satisfaction.

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#59

Post by strken »

ccppurcell wrote: post #27
roarcher wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't this just... normal? In the anglosphere maybe, but outside of that it seems to not be. My girlfriend is from SE Asia and her language's equivalent is evidently used exclusively to apologize for having wronged someone. I've had to explain my usage of "I'm sorry that [bad thing happened]" or "Sorry, but can I just [very minorly inconvenience you]" because she didn't understand what I was admitting fault for. In…

The I'm sorry (that someone died) is easy to explain as it's obviously connected to the word sorrow. The hardest is "sorry?" (I didn't understand or hear you)

Doesn't it come from "sorry [to make you repeat yourself], could you repeat that?"

Re: What British people mean when they say 'sorry'

#60

Post by smusamashah »

Now I want to know if "Thank You" also carries as many meanings. I came here from Pakistan for work 6 years ago. Article is about sorry the Thank you was a bigger cultural shock perhaps. Number of Thanks I got in first few months already surpassed all thankses I ever heard in Pakistan. This does not mean we are thankless but you won't get a Thanks for moving aside a step on a footpath, or holding a door if you ever did.
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