Watching the English

by Kate Fox

Courtesy A powerful ideal. Some of our politenesses are so deeply ingrained as to be almost involuntary, and thus fairly meaningless (the ‘sorry’ reflex, for example, is a knee-jerk response for most of us) but many require conscious or indeed acutely self-conscious effort. The English are often admired for our courtesy but condemned for our ‘reserve’, which is seen as arrogant, cold and unfriendly. Although our reserve is certainly a symptom of our social dis-ease, it is also, at least in part, a form of courtesy – the kind sociolinguists call ‘negative politeness’, which is concerned with other people’s need not to be intruded or imposed upon (as opposed to ‘positive politeness’, which is concerned with their need for inclusion and social approval). We judge others by ourselves, and assume that everyone shares our obsessive need for privacy – so we mind our own business and politely ignore them. But our polite sorries, pleases and thank-yous are not heartfelt or sincere – there is nothing particularly warm or friendly about them. Politeness by definition involves a degree of artifice and hypocrisy, but English courtesy seems to be almost entirely a matter of form, of obedience to a set of rules rather than expression of genuine feelings. So when we do break our own courtesy rules, we tend if anything to be more obnoxious and unpleasant than other less ‘polite’ nations. We need all these rules to protect us from ourselves.