Thoroughly enjoyed this BBC radio program on politeness. All the lunch guests were interesting and I particularly liked the historical perspective provided by Jason Hughes. I’d never thought about not blowing my nose on the table cloth as being good manners before.
Many thanks to Andreas Grundtvig for directing me to it.
I’ve just finished making the video below and it reminded me that when I first moved to the US, I found ending telephone calls a challenge. We used to get a lot of telemarketing calls back then (thankfully a law changed and we can now put our names on a no-call list). But the thing was, I could never find a way to cut the callers off. As Sabrina Gerland has commented elsewhere on this blog, it’s like British mothers fail to teach their kids how to say goodbye. But as you can see, I’ve got pretty good at it over the last 13 years…
This is a powerful value in the US and one of those values that, speaking as a Brit, I’ve found it hard to understand. It’s not that I want a tumultuous transition of power. On the contrary. I just don’t understand the weighting it’s given. It seems to me the need for a peaceful transition can supersede a rightful transition of power.
Back in 2004 when the ‘hanging chads’ debate had been settled by the supreme court, I caused an embarrassing argument at a dinner party. ‘It’s horrific that so many people have been disenfranchised’, I argued. And I got hot under the collar when Americans spoke with pride (in much more genial, polite and measured tones than mine) about the way power had been conveyed peacefully. It’s become one of those things that I have to keep reminding myself. The peaceful transition of power carries a different weighting here. It’s an important American value – really important. I think I presume it will happen automatically, but am I wrong to presume it can be taken for granted?
My take is still that Al Gore made a bad mistake back in 2004. Creating history like that allows misguided folks like Mike Turzai (in the video below) to believe that they can disenfranchise voters by requiring ID they don’t have and get away with it.
It’s been fascinating watching the legal challenges to voter ID unfold in Pennsylvania. But it’s just one of many story lines in this election and I have to say I’ve loved every one of them. I’ve found it way more interesting than a British election because more fundamental issues seem to come out into the open and get discussed – both hilariously in the late night talk shows (oh they are wonderful here) and in more serious venues like the broadsheets and the presidential debates too.
And I look at the discussion that’s been going on about whether Mark Thompson, ex BBC Director General, is fit to run the New York Times after the Jimmy Savile scandal. And (unlike many Brits I suspect) I doubt he is. I think maintaining the peace (as he did) often comes at an unacceptable price. I like the discussion I’ve seen here about the way power is used and abused so I’m inclined to favour more argy-bargy.
But what do you think? Any thoughts? And what results are you hoping for in Tuesday’s election?
I’ve mentioned elsewhere that British apologies can be very routine speech acts that mean, well, nothing apologetic really. By way of contrast, we see lots of the features we’d expect of a sincere British (and American?) apology here I think – the appearance (credible or not) of sincerity, an acknowledgement of wrong doing, a promise to learn from the mistake and hence the implication that you won’t err again, an explanation of how things went wrong (well, almost).
It contrasts well with the British BP chief’s apology, and of course Mitt Romney’s stance on the recent leaked video – how to stand your ground and not make an apology.
How far we’re willing to forgive and forget is always going to be determined by our political convictions, of course, but when we want to see how people handle the delicate task of saying sorry, politicians provide some lovely examples.
Here are couple of other past posts on apologies:
A new ‘merican collocation has entered my vocabulary that I wouldn’t have thought possible just a few days ago: ‘legitimate rape’.
What…? But how…? Surely…? I don’t know where to start. I’ve been living in and listening to this variety for fourteen years now but I can’t fathom it. How could those words be collocates? <sigh>
