Watching the English

by Kate Fox

  The conversation may jump from hair to shoes to thighs to professional achievement, fitness, social skills, dating success, children, talents and accomplishments – but the formula remains the same. Few compliments are ever wholeheartedly accepted; no self-denigrating remark ever goes unchallenged. When a compliment is too obviously accurate to be received with the customary flat or humorous denial, it is deflected with a hasty, embarrassed ‘Well, thank you, er . . .’ and the inevitable counter-compliment, or at least an attempt to change the subject.

  When I asked English counter-complimenters why they could not just accept a compliment, they usually responded by reiterating their denial of the specific compliment in question, and often attempting to throw in a counter-compliment to me while they were at it. This was not helpful, except in confirming that the rule was deeply ingrained, so I tried to phrase the question in more general terms, talking about the patterns I had observed in their conversation, and asking how they would feel about someone who just accepted a compliment, without qualification, and didn’t offer one in return. The typical response was that this would be regarded as rather impolite and unfriendly, possibly even arrogant – one woman told me that it would be ‘almost as bad as boasting’, a slightly extreme view, but others felt that such a person would at least be seen as ‘taking herself a bit too seriously’. One woman replied, and I swear this is true and was not prompted in any way, ‘Well, you’d know she wasn’t English!’

  Women in other cultures frequently exchange compliments too, of course – this is a standard form of female bonding-talk almost everywhere – and English women, like women everywhere, often conduct much more ‘simple’ exchanges of compliments of the ‘You look lovely’, ‘Thanks, you look great too’ variety. But the counter-compliment ritual is common enough to be of interest to me as a ‘pattern’, and its one-downmanship is typically English.

  Male Bonding: the Mine’s Better Than Yours Game

  The counter-compliment ritual may be distinctively English, but it is also distinctively female. One cannot imagine men, even English men, engaging in such an exchange. Think about it. ‘I wish I could play pool as well as you do. I’m so hopeless at it’; ‘Oh, no, I’m useless, really, that was just a lucky shot – and you’re brilliant at darts!’ If you find that remotely plausible, try: ‘You’re such a good driver – I’m always stalling and mixing up the gears!’; ‘Me? No, I’m a terrible driver, honestly – and, anyway, your car is so much better than mine, faster and more powerful.’ Not very likely, is it?

  English men have different means of achieving social bonding, which at first glance would appear to involve principles diametrically opposed to those of the counter-compliment ritual. While English women are busy paying each other compliments, English men are usually putting each other down, in a competitive ritual that I call the Mine’s Better Than Yours game.

  ‘Mine’, in this context, can be anything: a make of car, a football team, a political party, a holiday destination, a type of beer, a philosophical theory – the subject is of little importance. English men can turn almost any conversation, on any topic, into a Mine’s Better Than Yours game. I once listened to a forty-eight-minute Mine’s Better Than Yours conversation (yes, I timed it) on the merits of wet-shaving versus electric razors. And discussions of more ‘highbrow’ issues are no different: a lengthy debate on Foucault, conducted in the letters pages of the Times Literary Supplement, followed exactly the same pattern – and employed much the same kind of ad hominem arguments – as the shaving debate.

  The rules of the game are as follows. You start either by making a statement in praise of your chosen ‘Mine’ (electric razors, Manchester United, Foucault, German cars, whatever) or by challenging someone else’s assertion, or implication, or hint, that his ‘Mine’ is the best. Your statement will always be countered or challenged, even if the other male (or males) secretly agrees with you, or could not rationally disagree. One could hardly even imagine a male-bonding conversation in which a statement such as ‘Don’t know why you bought that piece of crap, when for the same price you could’ve had a BMW,’ elicited the response ‘Yes, I’m sure you’re right.’ It would be unthinkable, an unprecedented violation of macho etiquette.

  Although these exchanges may become quite noisy, and much swearing and name-calling may be involved, the Mine’s Better Than Yours game will still seem fairly good-natured and amicable, always with an undercurrent of humour – a mutual understanding that the differences of opinion are not to be taken too seriously. Swearing, sneering and insults are allowed, even expected, but storming off in a huff, or any other exhibition of real emotion, is not permitted. The game is all about mock anger, pretend outrage, jokey one-upmanship. However strongly you may feel about the product, team, theory or shaving method you are defending, you must not allow these feelings to show. Earnestness is not allowed; zeal is unmanly; both are un-English and will invite ridicule. And although the name I have given the game might suggest boastfulness, boasting is not allowed either. The merits of your car, razor, politics or school of literary theory can be glowingly extolled and explained in minute detail, but your own good taste or judgement or intelligence in preferring these must be subtly implied, rather than directly stated. Any hint of self-aggrandisement or ostentation is severely frowned upon, unless it is done ‘ironically’, in such an exaggerated manner as to be clearly intended as a joke.

  It is also universally understood that there is no way of actually winning the game. No one ever capitulates, or recognises the other’s point of view. The participants simply get bored or tired and change the subject, perhaps shaking their heads in pity at their opponents’ stupidity.

  The Mine’s Better Than Yours game is an exclusively male pastime. Accompanying females may occasionally spoil the fun by misunderstanding the rules and trying to inject an element of reason. They also tend to become bored with the predictability of the ritual, and may even do something unthinkable, such as asking the participants if they could not simply agree to disagree. These interjections are usually ignored. What some exasperated females fail to grasp is that there can be no rational resolution of such debates; neither is there even any desire to resolve the issue. These are no more genuine debates than the chanting of rival football supporters, and football fans do not expect their ritual chants to persuade their opponents to agree with them. (This is not to say that English female bonding is all ‘sweetness and light’. It may be generally less competitive than the male variety, but I have recorded female-bonding sessions – mainly among younger women, but of all social classes – which consisted almost entirely of exchanges of heavily ironic mock-insults, and in which the participants all referred to each other, with great and obvious affection, as ‘bitch’ or ‘slut’.)

  The two examples of bonding-talk – counter-compliment and Mine’s Better Than Yours – at first appear very different, and may indeed reflect some deep-seated universal differences between males and females. Much research in sociolinguistics has focused on this competitive/co-operative divide, and without subscribing to the more extreme of the ‘genderlect’ theories, it is clear that male bonding-talk often tends to be competitive, while female bonding-talk typically involves more ‘matching’ and co-operation.

  But these bonding-talk rituals also have certain important features in common, in their underlying rules and values, which may tell us a bit more about Englishness. Both, for example, involve proscription of boasting and prescription of humour. Both also require a degree of polite hypocrisy – or, at least, concealment of one’s real opinions or feelings (feigned admiration in the counter-compliment ritual, and fake light-heartedness in Mine’s Better Than Yours) – and in both cases, etiquette triumphs over truth and reason.

  AND FINALLY . . . THE LONG GOODBYE RULE

  We started this grooming-talk chapter with greeting-talk, so it is appropriate to conclude with parting-talk. I wish I could end on a positive note and say that the English are rather better at partings than
we are at greetings, but the truth is that our leave-takings tend to be every bit as awkward, embarrassed and incompetent as our introductions. Again, no one has a clear idea of what to do or say, resulting in the same aborted handshakes, clumsy cheek-bumping and half-finished sentences as the greeting process. The only difference is that while introductions tend to be hurried – scrambled through in an effort to get the awkwardness over with as quickly as possible – partings, as if to compensate, are often tediously prolonged.

  The initial stage of the parting process is often, deceptively, an unseemly rush, as no one wants to be the last to leave, for fear of ‘outstaying their welcome’ (a serious breach of the privacy rules). Thus, as soon as one person, couple or family stands up and starts making apologetic noises about traffic, baby-sitters, or the lateness of the hour, everyone else immediately looks at their watch, with exclamations of surprise, jumps to their feet and starts hunting for coats and bags and saying preliminary goodbyes. (Although ‘Pleased to meet you’ can be problematic as a greeting, it is acceptable to say ‘It was nice [lovely, great] to meet you’ at this point, if you are parting from people to whom you have recently been introduced – even if you have exchanged no more than a few mumbled greetings.) If you are visiting an English home, be warned that you should allow a good ten minutes – and it could well be fifteen or even twenty – from these initial goodbyes to your final departure.

  There is an old Dudley Moore piano-sketch – a spoof on the more flamboyant, self-indulgent, Romantic classical composers – in which he plays a piece that keeps sounding as though it has ended (da, da, DUM), but then continues with a trill leading to another dramatic ‘ending’ (diddly, diddly, dum, DUM, DA-DUM), followed by yet more ‘final’-sounding chords (DA, DA-DUM) then more, and so on. This sketch has always reminded me of a typical group of English people attempting to say goodbye to each other. Just when you think that the last farewell has been accomplished, someone always revives the proceedings with yet another ‘Well, see you soon, then . . .’, which prompts a further chorus of ‘Oh, yes, we must, er, goodbye . . .’, ‘Goodbye’, ‘Thanks again’, ‘Lovely time’, ‘Oh, nothing, thank you’, ‘Well, goodbye, then . . .’, ‘Yes, must be off – traffic, er . . .’ ‘Don’t stand there getting cold, now!’, ‘No, fine, really . . .’, ‘Well, goodbye . . .’ Then someone will say, ‘You must come round to us next . . .’ or ‘So, I’ll email you tomorrow, then . . .’ and the final chords will begin again.

  Those leaving are desperate to get away, and those hovering in the doorway are dying to shut the door on them, but it would be impolite to give any hint of such feelings, so everyone must make a great show of being reluctant to part. Even when the final, final, final goodbyes have been said, and everyone is loaded into the car, a window is often wound down to allow a few more parting words. As the leavers drive off, hands may be held to ears with thumbs and little fingers extended in a phone-shape, promising further communication. It is then customary for both parties to wave lingering, non-verbal goodbyes to each other until the car is out of sight. When the long-goodbye ordeal is over, we all heave an exhausted sigh of relief.

  As often as not, we then immediately start grumbling about the very people from whom, a moment earlier, we could apparently hardly bear to tear ourselves. ‘God, I thought they were never going to go!’ ‘The Joneses are very nice and all that, but she does go on a bit . . .’ Even when we have thoroughly enjoyed the gathering, our appreciative comments following the long goodbye will be mixed with moans about how late it is, how tired we are, how much in need of a cup of tea/strong drink – and how nice it is to have the place to ourselves again (or to be going home to our own bed).

  And yet if for any reason the long goodbye has been cut short, we feel uncomfortable, dissatisfied – and either guilty, if we have committed the breach of the rule, or somewhat resentful, if the other parties have been a bit hasty in their farewells. We may not be explicitly conscious of the fact that a rule has been broken, but we feel a vague sense of incompleteness; we know that somehow the goodbyes have not been said ‘properly’. To prevent such malaise, English children are indoctrinated in the etiquette of the long-goodbye ritual from an early age: ‘Say goodbye to Granny, now’; ‘And what do we say? We say thank you, Granny!’; ‘And say goodbye to Auntie Jane’; ‘No, say goodbye NICELY!’; ‘And say bye-bye to Pickles’; ‘We’re leaving now, so say goodbye again’; ‘Come on now, wave, wave bye-bye!’28

  The English often refer to this ritual not as ‘saying goodbye’ but as ‘saying our goodbyes’, as in ‘I can’t come to the station, so we’ll say our goodbyes here.’ I discussed this with an American visitor, who said, ‘You know, the first time I heard that expression, I didn’t really register the plural – or I guess I thought it meant you said one each or something. Now I know it means a LOT of goodbyes.’

  GROOMING-TALK RULES AND ENGLISHNESS

  The weather-speak rules have already given us some clues about the ‘grammar’ of Englishness, and the grooming-talk rules can now help us to identify a few more of the defining characteristics we are seeking.

  The rules of introduction confirm the weather-speaking findings on social inhibitions, and show that without ‘facilitators’ the English are quite unable to overcome these difficulties. A tendency to awkwardness, embarrassment and general social ineptitude must now be incorporated into our ‘grammar’ – an important factor, as this tendency must surely have a significant effect on all aspects of English social relations.

  The no-name rule highlights an English preoccupation with privacy, and a somewhat suspicious standoffishness. This rule has also given us the first hint of the convoluted, irrational, Looking-Glass nature of English etiquette. The ‘Pleased to meet you’ problem provides our first evidence of the way in which class-consciousness pervades every aspect of English life and culture, but also exposes our reluctance to acknowledge the issue.

  The gossip rules bring to light a number of important characteristics, the most striking of which is, again, the English obsession with privacy – also emphasised by the guessing-game rule, the distance rule, and the ‘exceptions that prove the rule’ of the print and internet media. The sex differences in gossip rules remind us that, in any culture, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the gander. This sounds like a rather obvious point, but it is one that was often ignored by early anthropologists, and is sometimes glossed over by those who comment on Englishness today: both have a tendency to assume that ‘male’ rules are the rules. Anyone who believes, for example, that the English are not very excitable or animated in their everyday speech, has clearly never listened to two English females gossiping. The normal rules of restraint and reserve, in this case, apply only to gossiping males.

  The rules of male and female bonding-talk reinforce the goose-and-gander point, but beneath striking (potentially dazzling) surface differences, they turn out to have critical features in common, including prohibition of boasting, prescription of humour and abhorrence of ‘earnestness’, polite hypocrisy and the triumph of etiquette over reason.

  Finally, the long-goodbye rule highlights (again) the importance of embarrassment and ineptitude in English social interactions – our apparently congenital inability to handle simple matters such as greeting and parting with any consistency or elegance – but also provides a remarkable example of the irrational excesses of English politeness.

  20. To be fair, I should point out that although ‘How do you do?’ is technically a question, and written as such, it is spoken as a statement – with no rising, interrogative intonation at the end – so the custom of repeating it back is not quite as absurd as it might seem (almost, but not quite).

  21. I was rather chuffed, and at the same time slightly alarmed, to see that this observation has now been taken up (more or less verbatim) and enshrined in at least one English etiquette guide – alarmed because it was not my intention for the unwritten ‘awkwardness is correct’ rule to become an ‘official’ rule
. I was also interested to see that Debrett’s online guide to ‘British behaviour’ includes many observations from this book (more scrupulously paraphrased, of course).

  22. And this was research conducted in a manner of which I approve, not by questionnaire or lab experiments but by eavesdropping on real conversations in natural settings, so we can have some confidence in these findings.

  23. There are, of course, other theories of language evolution, the most appealing of which is Geoffrey Miller’s proposition that language evolved as a courtship device – to enable us to flirt. Fortunately, the ‘chat-up’ theory of language evolution is not incompatible with the ‘gossip’ theory, providing one accepts that gossip has multiple functions, including status-display for courtship purposes.

  24. This is even more evident in the USA, where ‘Hi-how-are-you?’ or ‘Hey-how-are-you?’ has become a standard throwaway greeting – similar to the English ‘How do you do?’ except that little or no response is required, whereas ‘How do you do?’ requires the polite repetition of the non-question.