In my last newsletter, I reacted to this news story:
The article is about addressing teachers as sir or miss, which happens in American schools too (I'm sure there's a lot of variation in that across schools and regions). But in the newsletter I mentioned BrE referential use of the words when talking about the teacher (rather than talking to the teacher). I said: "I’m often taken aback when my child (like any ordinary English child) refers to her teachers as Sir and Miss"—which she often does.
My former colleague David replied to say that he found this odd, since as "a moderately ordinary English child in the north of England in the 1960s," he addressed his (all male) teachers as Sir, but would refer to them by name or description (e.g., our English teacher). He concluded that "referring to teachers as Sir and Miss may be either more recent or more southern."
While the usage may have been new in the 1960s, it definitely existed then, apparently even in the north.
The OED's first citation for that use of Sir is from 1955 in a novel by Edward Blishen, who hailed from London: "‘The cane,’ said Sims vaguely. ‘Sir can't,’ said Pottell...’" A few other quotations can be seen in the OED snippet below (note their nice new layout!)
On to Miss. The first referring-to-(not addressing)-a-teacher citation for Miss is from 1968 in a book by an author from Salford (in the northwest). (You'll spot another Miss example from that book in the Sir examples above. I've reported the error.)
Did Miss really only appear a decade after referential Sir? I doubt it. We have to rely on written records, usually published ones, and there aren't a lot of written records in the voice of schoolchildren. Fiction helps, but it has its biases and gaps.
And then, of course, there was the 1967 British film To Sir, with Love, in which Sir is used as if it is the name of the teacher played by Sidney Poitier. Is it a term of address there, or referential? Well, the title always seemed weird to me—certainly not a way I'd address a package. This Sir seems halfway between address and reference. We could label packages with the second-person pronouns that we usually used to address people, i.e., "To you", but we tend to use the third person: "To David". Rather than addressing the recipient, it seems to be announcing the recipient.
This past academic year, for the first time, I was addressed as
Miss a fair amount (no name, just
Miss). This came from a new student who apparently was carrying over school habits to university, and so my colleagues were all
Miss as well. I thought often about saying something about it to the student, but I also thought: I know what they mean, so why bother? I get to correct people enough in my job, I don't have to take every opportunity to do so and certainly don't need to make a big deal out of what I'm called. (Just don't call me late for dinner.) One picks one's pedantic battles. It's not a million miles from how I feel about my students calling a lecture or seminar a
lesson,
which I've written about back here.
If you're interested, here's more I've written on:
I was also a moderately ordinary English child in the north of England in the 1960s, and I didn’t use ‘sir” and “miss” in this way at all; I was surprised to hear my (London) children do so.
ReplyDeleteI was a moderately ordinary English child in the south of England in the 1960s and 70s and I, also, did not reference teachers as Sir or Miss. Neither in my (tiny, village) primary school or in my larger grammar school. Of course, amongst ourselves, we used their nicknames!
DeleteI was born in London in 1953. I started nursery school age three. We addressed all teachers as sir/miss then and all the way through until leaving in 1971. If we used their surname then it was Mr/Mrs/Miss.
ReplyDeleteOn the subject of media usage there was also a sitcom called Please, Sir that commenced in 1968.
Lastly from 1933 with have Goodbye, Mr Chips:
"This is an occasion, you know--this last farewell of ours. I feel rather like a new boy beginning his first term with you. Not scared, mind you--but just, for once, in a thoroughly respectful mood. Shall I call you 'sir'--or would 'Mr. Chips' be the right thing? 'Mr. Chips,' I think. Good-bye, then--good-bye, Mr. Chips. . . .”
Addressing teachers in this way is what was old in this time period. It is the referential use (e.g. "Sir told me to do it" said to someone other than the teacher) that is what was new in the 50s.
DeleteMy daughter's primary school, unusually, did not allow them to address teachers as Sir or Miss, but encouraged then to use first names - thid was very strange in the mid-1980s. My daughter said once that she had heard a teacher telling another child, "You may call me Mrs Smith, or you may call me Jane, but you may NOT call me Miss!"
ReplyDeleteI'm another one who was at school in the north of England in the sixties.
ReplyDeleteIn those days, there was a difference between primary school (5-11) and secondary school (11-18). In primary school you had one class teacher most of the year, but in secondary school it was a different teacher for each subject. I left primary school in 1964, so my memory is a bit hazy, but I think I'd have said, "The teacher said..." rather than sir or miss. At secondary school, saying "Sir said..." would not give enough information and it would be "Mr X said..."
If you're already talking about a particular class, though, 'sir' is informative enough. That's how I hear it from my child:
DeleteMe: "You haven't submitted your history worksheet"
Child: "Sir told us not to."
But I think I would have said, "The teacher told me not to." Or, if it could one of several teachers, "Mr X told me not to."
DeleteIncidentally, married female teachers, I think, would have been referred to as Mrs X.
comment catcher!
ReplyDeleteI refer you to the books of "Miss Read", published from the mid 1950s onwards, about a village primary school, its children and parents.
ReplyDeleteAnd "To Sir With Love" is based on the autobiographical novel of that title by ER Braithwaite, published in 1959, but drawing on experiences from the mid-40s onwards.
ReplyDeleteThat suggests it had been an established usage for quite some time.
I’m curious to know where in America teachers are currently addressed (or referred to) as Sir or Miss. I attended public schools in Pennsylvania and American schools for expatriates in various parts of the world, and my teachers were always Mr., Mrs., Miss, or Dr. [surname] when directly addressed or referred to indirectly (this was in the 1980s). My kids more recently attended public school in the southeastern US. Their teachers were either Mr., “Miz”, Coach, or Dr. [surname]. (“Miz” indicating pronunciation, regardless of whether the teacher signed her emails Mrs. or Ms.)
ReplyDeleteSir or Miss in any context would sound quite alien. Maybe in rural deep south?
Yes, I agree with this. I attended school in Florida, Maryland (DC area), on a US military base in Germany, and in Texas and the approach you describe was consistent across all of those schools. Of course in college we used "Dr."
Deletethinking about it further, some of my expatriate classmates from Texas or Oklahoma used “sir” and “ma’am” (never Miss) when replying to any adult in authority, sometimes including their parents. It was always in response to a question or instruction (yes, ma’am; no, sir), never when directly addressing the adult and definitely never when referring to them. That usage seems to be dying, at least in the part of the southeast where we live.
ReplyDeleteYes, it’s the ‘yes, sir’ kind of thing i was thinking about. Having been in Tennessee last week and having been addressed as ‘Miss’ much more than I am used to, I wanted to leave the possibility open. But I am claiming that the referential use is not found in AmE (lynneguist talking!)
ReplyDeleteIn my North of England boys only grammar school in the1960s, we would address the masters (never teachers) as "sir" with one exception and refer to them as "Mr X" to members of staff and "X" or more likely a nickname among ourselves. The only female member of staff in my first year insisted on being referred to as "sir" !
ReplyDeleteReporting from the rest of the Commonwealth: I went to school in New Zealand and now live in Australia. This usage of Sir and Miss is completely foreign to me. (And I was a bit shocked when I heard it was still a thing, and not just from old novels.) We did of course call our teachers Mr. and Ms. Surname, but definitely never Sir. My schooling was post-2000, though, so it's possible this once existed in NZ and AU and has now long died out.
ReplyDeleteMy schooling was in Australia in the 60s and 70s. Definitely didn't do the Sir and Miss thing. Teachers were always addressed and referenced by their honorific and name. Or just their nickname in the right company.
Deletein the '70s in NZ we were def expected to address teachers as "sir", I can't remember what the convention for female teachers was - probably "Miss [name]"? - but referring to someone as "Sir" in the 3rd person would only have been done sarcastically.
DeleteIn the late 1950s/60s in the English Midlands we called our teachers Mr/Mrs/Miss [surname], as they also did at the primary school where my mother taught.
ReplyDeleteI am surprised to learn of this usage's recency, as it has always came off as old fashioned to me. I went to a state school in the south of England in the 80s and we did not use Sir or Miss as referential terms at the primary school level at least (we had moved to Canada by the time I was getting close to secondary level so I have no frame of reference for that.
ReplyDeleteIn my school in the north of England in the 1908s we called and referred to all our teachers as Mr/Mrs/Miss Surname. Apart from one of my sister's teachers, a Mr Ballard, who informed the class that he wished to be addressed as Sir. My sister used to refer to him as "Sir Ballard".
ReplyDelete1908s! How old are you? :-)
DeleteI went to school across Wales and Southern England in the 70's and early 80's. I remember mostly the title+surname format, but there was a bit of "yes sir, no miss" to answer instructions. Nicknames for referential address for the most part, although one of our teachers was also the father of a classmate, so not always.
ReplyDeleteAt university, first name, always. My partner went to a different university with a German HOD who insisted students always used the proper honorific. So it was always Prof. X, Dr. Y in written or verbal communication. Even students in other departments thought that was odd though.
I went to school in the Midlands in the 80s. I definitely remember using "Sir" and "Miss" both to address my teachers and to refer to them, as in: "Where's Sir going?" or "Miss told me to go outside."
ReplyDeleteI have a vague recollection, however, that this was only the case at my (fairly working class) primary school, and that once I was at grammar school we were instructed to always address and refer to our teachers as Mr/Mrs/Miss [last name].
It used to be in the UK that employees in posh places like hotels and upmarket department stores used Sir/Madam (and to some extent Miss/Master) when speaking to or referring to customers. I remember phrases like 'If Sir would like to try on this jacket', or 'Please follow me, Madam'. Maybe some still do. You also hear that in servants' language in films or TV shows set in the past. But the trend here seems to be to drop Mr/Mrs/etc titles entirely in many scenarios. In my workplace, senior or junior, everyone used just first names. At my (Anglican) church, the clergy are invariably addressed and referred to by their first names. So if schools don't like Sir/Miss, what are suggesting? Calling female teachers 'Madam' sounds ridiculously posh. Calling male teachers 'Mister' - well, that's only commonly used in 'Hey, mister, can you spare some change?'. Perhaps they should all be 'Mx' as in 'Please, Mx, can I leave the room?'
ReplyDeleteWhat's wrong with "Mrs Smith" and "Mr Jones"? But the use of first names is very odd - as I said above, my daughter's primary school, in the 1980s, expected the children to use their teachers' first names, which is not something I've come across elsewhere. At her (private) secondary school, they used Mrs, Miss or Dr So-and-so, as did I at mine. In our Methodist churches, clergy are usually Reverend FirstName, older men and women are "Auntie" or "Uncle" so-and-so...
DeleteIn one of Lucilla Andrews' novels (I forget the title), set in the 1960s or early 1970s, the heroine's 7-year-old daughters refers to her teachers as "The Sir with brown hair" and "The Sir with yellow hair" until she learns their names. I think boys' fee-paying schools address male teachers as "Sir", but do not refer to them like that, except perhaps ironically. (cf Antonia Forest "The Attic Term", where Patrick complains that his teachers want to be called by their first names, but he prefers them to "know their place and answer to Sir!"); however "Miss" is not used as either a form of address or as a reference - they are always "Miss Brown", "Mrs Green", etc. And they usually stamp on being addressed as "Miss" , ans in "Please, Miss, what's the homework?"
ReplyDeleteI was at school in East Anglia in the 80s and 90s and at secondary school we definitely used sir and miss both for addressing teachers and referring to them. I'm surprised using it to refer to teachers is so recent. I don't think we used sir and miss at all in primary school.
ReplyDeleteA bit relatedly, in your (Lynneguist's) experience or that of anyone else reading this, do (some) children in primary / elementary schools outside the UK refer to all female teachers as 'Miss (Surname)', regardless of their marital status or address preference? For example, calling or referring to Mrs Jones as 'Miss Jones'? Some children in my class (Southern England, 1980s) did that, and now some children in my daughter's class (Northern England) still do. I presume it's an extension of the address and reference of all female teachers being 'Miss' for these children: they assume that therefore the correct form is always 'Miss', even when the name is attached. That did used to annoy our married female teachers.
ReplyDeleteWhere I'm from, we were always aware of the Miss/Mrs distinction and which teachers were which, but I can't promise that that is the same everywhere in the country
ReplyDeleteAs an American woman living in the UK (London) I find the use of titles for women here to be shockingly old fashioned. Using “miss” for an adult working woman sounds so infantilizing. I physically cringe. Miss is for children IMHO. And no one needs to know a woman’s marital status - use Ms. I’ve sometimes even seen people use Mrs. Husband’s Name. !?!?!? Is she property? In Seattle, where we lived before, my kids called all teachers and staff (including the head of school) by their first names. That’s certainly unusual, even for the US, but I liked it. It’s not uncommon in the US to hear Mr or Mrs First Name for teachers. And then they are referenced in the same manner. Here, at an International School in London, there is one teacher (she/her) who goes by Sir and also addresses all her students as Sirs. I like language to evolve with current values.
ReplyDeleteI suppose the use of 'Miss' goes back to the days when women automatically gave up work upon marriage, so there were very few married female teachers.
ReplyDeleteI went to both primary and secondary schools on the outskirts of London during the 1980's. In primary we addressed male teachers as Sir and female teachers Miss without the use of surnames, unless referring to them when we used Mr/Mrs/Miss surname. In secondary Sir and Miss as forms of address on there own was seen as slightly 'childish' and we were expected to know the teachers name and use the relevant honorific, although some didn't and Sir and Miss was still heard sometimes. Personally I've always disliked formality and even aged ten or so I made a conscious decision not to address teachers by a honorific. As I was (or would like to think) a compliant, polite and pleasant young girl my lack of the use of titles was never that I can remember picked up or even commented on. During the whole of my schooldays I never once thought 'Miss' was demeaning or in any way or lower in status than 'Sir' it was just a catch all name for female teacher and I'm sure that was how it was viewed by all the kids, and most if not all of the staff, females included. Subsequently at eighteen when at university it was first names with the staff. Having later qualified as a Chartered Accountant in my mid twenties I became a teacher for a short while in a female prison specifically for one prisoner who was having trouble with a part of her exams in an area I specialised in. During the first lesson I took with this lady (who was nearly twice my age and slightly older than my mother) she addressed me as 'Miss'. Bemused I asked her if she had done this because she felt we were in a 'classroom' setting, she replied "no that's what we have to call female staff (male staff were called Sir I believe) unless they give us permission to use their first names". I immediately gave her permission to use my first name but that was eschewed as she told me she felt I should be shown same respect as all the other staff. Thankfully she managed to pass the exam and I later received via the prison a bunch of flowers and a card from her addressed to me with my first name which was very sweet. About fifteen or so years later I bumped into her at Euston Station completely out of the blue, during our shortish conversation (we were both catching trains believe or not!!) she never once failed to address me as Miss!! old habits die hard!!
ReplyDelete"During the whole of my schooldays I never once thought 'Miss' was demeaning or in any way or lower in status than 'Sir' it was just a catch all name for female teacher and I'm sure that was how it was viewed by all the kids, and most if not all of the staff, females included."
DeleteI very much agree; my time at secondary school was very similar, although around ten years earlier than yours. In my recollection, Sir and Miss were very much used in that sense at secondary school.
Your comment about the prison service also rings very true. I know a couple of women that have worked in the police and also the prison service. They both said the same thing that people would very often refer to them as Miss, eg "Oh, Miss, can you do this for me please?". It was very much a term of respect, unlike what was said in that newspaper article.
Bit late to this, but in a similar vein to what you said about the 1967 film "To Sir With Love" there is also the book published in 1953 "Down With Skool", the first of the "Nigel Molesworth" books by Geoffrey Willans, illustrated by Ronald Searle.
ReplyDeleteThe title of Chapter Two is "Boo to Sir, or Are Masters Nesessessary?"
I don't recall the use of the word Sir being used like that elsewhere in the book but, there again, I don't think there was speech referencing a teacher - it was always a pupil speaking to a teacher, in which case "sir" would naturally be used.
I don't recall
I was at secondary school in the late 90s in South Yorkshire; generally it was common to refer to the teachers referentially as miss or sir if there was no ambiguity or importance which one it was:Eg "sir's given us this homework" or "ask miss if i can borrow a pen".
ReplyDeleteas a kid in the US, I definitely used Mr./Ms./Mrs. Lastname, but the difference was purely in writing. This may be a personal preference, since a librarian did correct one of my teachers once, saying "Oh, Mrs. xxxxxx was my mother", after he had used the Mrs. (Miss-es). But I don't really use the phonetic distinction. As a referential, I would use Mr./Ms. Lastname or "my english teacher"
ReplyDelete