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Originally Posted by Red5

Originally Posted by MrPedantic http://www.usingenglish.com/forum/im...s/viewpost.gif
By "formal letters", I would understand letters with certain kinds of content to your bank, solicitor, children's school, suppliers, clients, etc
;-)

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Why are certain categories of people deemed to be special? Bank managers and solicitors are the scum of the earth aren't they?

Children's schools are normally run by teachers who've probably never left school themselves....suppliers are probably run by people with less than 2 A'levels (or equivalent).

As for automated electronic reading of CVs...perhaps one might refer to the utter debacle which is ongoing in England at the moment where qualified Doctors were required to apply for jobs online using automated CV scanners.....the whole system has been scrapped because it is really incapable of any intelligence. See

BBC NEWS | Health | Doctors' job website is suspended

for the full story.


My own CV always comes with the statement: "this CV is NOT to be scanned into any automatic system as they are wholly incapable of extracting the full value of the experience depicted therein. It must only be presented to potential clients in it's original full colour format."

Despite this, I even had one job agency phoning me to ask 'Is PhD an O'level or a General Non-Vocational Qualification? (GNVQ in the UK)'.

Formality doesn't matter. Content, and the recipient's intelligence does.

I do hope you are meaning to be facetious in your comments about bank managers and solicitors, not to mention teachers.

Formality has its place, just as good manners have. To know when to use either indicates a civilized person. To regard either as unnecessary is the mark of a boor.

Nope.

I always speak my mind so that I don't hide anything. Why does anyone ever want to speak any way else?

One is free to makes one's own opinions about whether that is a quality to be admired, or an insult to a society that prefers to hide behind niceties. I choose the former.

Why does virtually every condominium in the USA have a sign on their entrance door saying "NO SOLICITORS"? Whenever has anyone ever referred to "my favourite bank manager?" Those two occupations in particular have always been the butt of jokes in any language!

My comment about teachers is quite valid: the great majority have never left the education enviroment and thus can very often have a very limited view on real-world reality since they have very often not experienced it first hand. That is not to say that some are not very good at what they do - I once taught someone from the age of 13, who went through school, college, university, then started teaching Business Studies without EVER having had a job in business (actually his FIRST job ever was as a teacher). He was, and still is, a very excellent teacher, and is still a good friend. He does however totally lack any sort of business acumen and has absolutely no direct experience to call on in his teachings....everything he teaches is that which has been gained from other teachers.....don't you see a little bit of incest creeping in here? Is that good?

Pedant

I understand your reluctancy toward formalites, or "niceties" as you called them, because they can easily make some people feel superior / inferior to others. But that does not have to be like that. They are just formalities, pure and simple. There can be mean people among the low educated, who are more informal in their ways, as there are nice people among the highly educated who are prone to being more formal. There can be bankers with a lot of integrity despite formalities, and teachers with a pretty narrow perspective on their subject, but with a broad life experience. And vice-versa. When I was in the States, I had to work hard to write a formal letter to a Superintendent since my husband almost got fired from school for not being able to manage those untenable students. She told me frankly that the formality of the letter impressed her and made her take my request into consideration, thus "sparing" him and offering him another job, in the same school. I also thought it weird that a simple formality should make such a huge difference in understanding someone's situation. If I had written the letter in plain language, and had been more informal/personal with her, she would have probably looked down on me. She took this formality as a sign of respect, and showed me respect in return. I am not saying this is right, but this is reality. The world is not fair, there are conventions and conventions, and subtle, unuttered consequences for breaking them. But again, one mustn't fall into the trap of interpreting these formalities as though some people were better/worse than others, but as simple rules of a game. The world is a stage, as Shakespeare put it...
bianca

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Originally Posted by pedant

My own CV always comes with the statement: "this CV is NOT to be scanned into any automatic system as they are wholly incapable of extracting the full value of the experience depicted therein. It must only be presented to potential clients in it's original full colour format."

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Formality may not matter to you, but shouldn't that be its original...?:-D

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Originally Posted by pedant

Nope.

I always speak my mind so that I don't hide anything. Why does anyone ever want to speak any way else?

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I believe it's called adulthood. ;-)

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Originally Posted by pendant

One is free to makes one's own opinions about whether that is a quality to be admired, or an insult to a society that prefers to hide behind niceties. I choose the former.

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It's a two-way street. 'One' is equally free to ignore such opinions.

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Originally Posted by pendant

My comment about teachers is quite valid: the great majority have never left the education enviroment and thus can very often have a very limited view on real-world reality since they have very often not experienced it first hand.

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The same can be said about doctors, lawyers, and so on.

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Originally Posted by pendant

I once taught someone from the age of 13, ... everything he teaches is that which has been gained from other teachers.....don't you see a little bit of incest creeping in here? Is that good?

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You tell us. You were, after all, his teacher. :oops: Speaking of which, who taught you ... ?

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Originally Posted by pedant

Why are certain categories of people deemed to be special? Bank managers and solicitors are the scum of the earth aren't they?

Children's schools are normally run by teachers who've probably never left school themselves....suppliers are probably run by people with less than 2 A'levels (or equivalent).

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The qualifications, etc. would probably vary from bank/law firm/school/supplier to bank/law firm/school/supplier.

The object of a formal style is not to flatter your correspondent, but to maintain a certain distance. This can be an advantage in certain situations, whether you're the "client" or the "supplier".

Of course, there are situations where it isn't an advantage; in which case you don't use it.

MrP

Hi Friend

Double space make the sentence chaotic. But I suggest you do not conscious about these things.

Welcome, gaur11111. :hi:

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Originally Posted by Tdol

Formality may not matter to you, but shouldn't that be its original...?:-D

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yes. at 3am one can make errors, despite one having been awake for 22 hours..... The irony is, the people to whom it that sentence is normally directed almost certainly wouldn't pick that up.