LL-L "Sociolinguistics" 2002.09.06 (01) [E]

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From: globalmoose at t-online.de (Global Moose Translations)
Subject: LL-L "Sociolinguistics" 2002.09.05 (06) [E]

Hi Elsie & all,

there also seems to be a tendency among women with higher education to
use
"du" among their peer group. When my children were little in the
mid-to-late
eighties, we joined a toddler playgroup. Interestingly enough, all
mothers
with a university education automatically called each other "du" even
when
they met for the first time, while all those who had left school early
to
take up a profession insisted on calling others and being addressed as
"Sie". This is probably a result of the different environments (college
vs.
office atmosphere) we encountered during our "socially formative years";
still, I found it interesting because one might have expected those with
a
higher education to be more formal instead of the other way round.

Regards,
Gabriele Kahn

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Sociolinguistics

Gabriele,

What you described does not surprise me in the least.  My experiences
are similar and are not limited to female speakers.

Please remember that in Europe the "revolution" of the 1960s was by and
large led, certainly dominated, by left-wing university students (and
their hangers-on who wanted to fit in with them socially).  It was
mostly they who were out to bring about changes in part by setting
precedents.  They tried very hard to first change the social climate of
academia, which particularly in Germany was and in part still is
extremely archaic, hierarchical and elitist.  (What was the students'
slogan again?  "... Jahren den Muff unter den Talaren!"  I forgot.)  The
first thing they did was to relax the tone within their own ranks.  I
witnessed a number of hostile acts against the more conservative
professors, total disruption of their lectures, and some of those
professors who were either afraid or sympathetic also started accepting
being addressed with _du_ and first name by students.  This "revolution"
has never really been totally reversed, although there has been a
partial swing back to the old order.  However, very little of this, if
anything, spilled over into the world of office workers, probably
because the groups we are talking about here are socially more separated
in Germany.

I personally have also noticed that Germans with tertiary education are
on the whole more inclined to avoid formal address, at least among each
other and in contact with people who they believe have similar
educational backgrounds.  I have noticed this both with women and with
men.  I find this to still be prevalent among the 1960s "rebel rousers"
who are now middle-aged.

I wonder if a contributing factor is that people with tertiary education
tend to have more experience with foreign cultures and foreign languages
and thus are more inclined to compare and to question and/or reject
certain home traditions.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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