Hacker News Reader

Comment by lf-non | Hacker News Reader

I have often wondered if the concept of encoding politeness/formalism at language level was common in other cultures outside Indian subcontinent. Interesting to see this confirmed.

In southern Indian languages, a similar differentiation of formal/informal exists. In northern/eastern languages things are even more nuanced because three levels of politeness exist. This sometimes results in some very awkward scenarios when someone from south is erroneously interpreted as being impolite even when they themselves think they are being polite (I am from a place in north which is frequented by many pilgrims from south).

In the north, esp. in business contexts a dialect of Hindi is getting popular which eschews these levels of formalisms and blends idioms to be closer to English.

View on HN

I think English is the exception rather than the norm, many languages encode politeness and formality within words and variations of words themselves, although where the differences are encoded may change. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_pronouns_in_Portugues...

Many European languages also have politeness levels (often just two levels, where the plural or third person is usually used for the polite level).

English had a similar distinction in the past, with distinct singular/plural pronouns "thou"/"you", and the plural "you" being used for polite speech, but of course "thou" has disappeared over time.

FWIW I think English still retains additional politeness levels in the form of addressing someone in third rather than second person, although this is mostly seen as archaic. In media you'll typically see servants do this when addressing masters/lordship.

Could you give an example? Not a native speaker, and I don't think I've ever heard or read anyone using third person to refer to the person they are directly addressing.

“Would m'lord want another cup of tea?” opposed to “you” is stereotypical language of servants to noblemen.

Even more formal is of using proxy objects, as in to not refer to a person directly, but some quality of him, “your highness” is the most obvious example.

Ohh, I understand what you mean now, thanks!

I was thinking of something like "would he like a cup of tea?" when you said third person, and that didn't seem to match anything I'd heard/read, so I was feeling very confused.

Yes, I was thinking honorifics and such instead of pronouns.

It didn't just disappear, though, the story is more interesting than that.

England had an outbreak of religious fanaticism, there was a regicide, dictatorship, a bunch of the losers got kicked out of the country and ended up in the colonies. The Dissenters, also known as the Ranters and Levelers, refused to use the formal pronoun, and insisted of calling everyone 'thou'.

The pendulum swung pretty hard and English dropped thou entirely in response.

Spanish has a polite/formal form called "usted" where different verbs are used. Afaik its used in formal settings including some work situations and when speaking to people you don't know - but generational differences modulate this somewhat.

https://www.quieroaprenderidiomas.com/idioma-castellano/uste...

The Korean system is famously complex: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_speech_levels

Oh wow. seven levels !

It's a simplified analysis that Japanese verbal suffixes encode politeness, though even Japanese grammarians analyse them as such but it doesn't match descriptively how they are used.

Other analyses more so analyse these forms as creating distance between oneself and the statement, lending them a more impersonal tone. A similar effect to how “would” can be used in English to say, say, “That would be the case.” instead of “That is the case.” which also sounds less direct and more polite, because it creates distance.

Japanese native speakers have been known to use the “plain” form even in communication with superiors when such distance is not appropriate, such as when expressing genuine concern.

https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/da-vs-desu-in-real-life/

Japanese grammarians have analysed many forms in across many lines which do not really reflect how Japanese native speakers descriptively use them. “gendered speech” is another one that is commonly criticized.

Another similar case is Dutch, where textbooks will tell there is one way to say “you” to superiors and one way to peers and inferiors. In reality the “superior” “you” simply creates distance and sounds as though one is speaking to someone one is not on personal terms with. It's really not much different from “Mr. Johnson” vs. “John” and while the former is more commonly used against a superior, it can also feel inappropriate for a superior to use the latter even when talking to an inferior.

In Romanian we have two markers for politeness. First, which is very common in European languages, we use plural forms instead of singular ones when politely directly addressing a single person. Secondly, we have particular polite pronouns - for example, "tu/voi" is informal "you/you" , but the polite pronoun is "dumneavoastră" (which is essentially a contraction from "domnia voastră", "your lordship"). We even use these when referring to someone else - el/ei, ea/ele are the informal he/they, she/they; but we also have dumnealui/dumnealor, dumneai/dumnealor for the polite versions (again, contractions of his/her/their lordship/ladyship(s)).

Interestingly, there are a bunch of other polite pronouns that have fallen out of use in most of the country, and have now taken on a sarcastic/mocking connotation (dânsul/dânsa/dânșii/dânsele for third person, and dumneata for second person).

>Interestingly, there are a bunch of other polite pronouns that have fallen out of use in most of the country, and have now taken on a sarcastic/mocking connotation (dânsul/dânsa/dânșii/dânsele for third person, and dumneata for second person).

Funny! I only know Romanian from my grandparents, and I haven't lived in Romania, so I thought these were fairly normal still :)

Actually, I'm saying "most of the country", but what I only know for sure they are out of use in middle-class-ish Bucharest, they may well be alive and well in a lot of the rest of the country. Though I was explicitly taught in school that they shouldn't be used as polite.

In German we have only one, but very common courtesy form in the language. The use of Sie instead of Du for 'you' in formal occasions. Tends to trip English speakers up a little bit.

“You” is also a polite plural that became default and displaced “thou”. Probably slightly differently but in the same category.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/why-did-we-sto...

The pronoun that had previously been restricted to addressing more than one person (ye or you) started to see service as a singular pronoun. Initially you was used to refer to a person of high social standing (such as royalty, who would be addressed as “your majesty”) but soon came to be used as well when speaking with a social equal.

As a result, poor thou was downgraded, and was used primarily when referring to a person of lower social standing, such as a servant. However, this pronoun did not disappear, as it also functioned as an indicator of familiarity or intimacy, and retained its function as a singular form of address for God in many cases in ecclesiastical writings.

An odd artefact of this difference is that in many English speaking TV shows (especially up to the 2000s) translators would use the more formal "Sie" by default even when the show itself clearly suggested a level of familiarity or intimacy that made this weird.

> was downgraded, and was used primarily when referring to a person of lower social standing, such as [...] a singular form of address for God

what do you mean i messed up the context?

One interesting thing I've noticed after moving from Poland to Germany is that while both languages have two politeness levels (du/Sie and ty/pan respectively), the rules governing their use are vastly different. It seems that the German system is mostly age-based (most of the time you only address people older than you formally), while the Polish one is relationship and familiarity-based (you address people you don't know and people you've met in certain circumstances formally). It's common to see Polish people who've met each other at a larger stage of life keeping using formal pronouns in casual conversations. However, in written communication, Germans default to the formal way; Poles write announcements, letters etc. with casual pronouns. An instruction manual written in first person formal instead of infinitives tells me that this instruction has been translated in Germany :)

In Filipino, you add "po" to make things polite.

Same for italian. We use "il lei" (3rd person) as polite form.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com