Question for the ladies.........

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shoz
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Question for the ladies.........

Post by shoz »

If you receive a letter from someone who doesn't know your marital status, how should it be started - Dear Miss, Ms....? Surely it would be wrong to start it with Mrs. Which would cause the least offence?
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Re: Question for the ladies.........

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shoz wrote:If you receive a letter from someone who doesn't know your marital status, how should it be started - Dear Miss, Ms....? Surely it would be wrong to start it with Mrs. Which would cause the least offence?
If I were to receive such a letter, being a mere male, I would hope that it were addressed to none of these ...................

However Shoz does present a knotty problem when one is writing rather than receiving such a letter. At Housie we were taught that females were always to be addressed as "Dear Mrs" or "Dear Miss" whenever the informal use of the Christian name was inappropriate. If the marital status was unknown, we were clearly taught that "Mrs" should be used - it being the superior status to spinsterhood, just as "Mr" should be used in the place of "Master" where there is doubt.

Many years after my departure from CH, with the rise of the feminist movement, the sobriquet "Ms" was adopted by those women who for whatever reason did not wish to disclose their marital status - perhaps feeling that it was none of our business whether they were married or not.

I for one found (and still find) this hard to bear. Not only does it fly in the face of the clear dictum which we received at "the best school in the world", but it is pronounced with an incredibly ugly sound - "Mizz" - a sound, in my view, is quite unbefitting of the fairer sex. Personally, I prefer the old fashioned "Mistress" which in the school's earlier years, as Shakespeare bears witness, did not then bear the same connotations as it does today. Having said that, and at the risk of being here bombarded by the excellent CH sorority, the modern meaning of the word Mistress will often, in my view, be quite a propos for those who wish to be known by the title of Ms. Nor, I think should this happy estate of Mistresshood be considered unworthy it being the strength and succour of many men whose domestic lifestyle remains otherwise somewhat unfulfilled.

On the other side of the coin, I do feel that people's wishes in this matter should be respected. However much I may dislike addressing someone as "Mizz", if that is what they definitely want, I must swallow any aesthetic reservations I may have and go along with it.

So how do I resolve all these conflicting issues where I am writing to a lady whose exact status is unknown? Well, if their status is unknown to me, it is likely that they too are unknown to me. That usually lets me out of having to use "Ms" for, as I have said earlier, I only feel compelled to use it when I know that is how they want me to address them.

Thus I have two remaining options: I can either revert to my childhood instruction in the English block, and use "Mrs" or - happy deliverance - should they have signed themselves with both Christian and surnames, I can escape the dilemma by using the same form - e.g. "Dear Jennifer Thistlebottom". After all, by not clarifying the situation from the outset, and also by affording the modern compliment of early disclosure of first names, the lady in question gives me entitlement to use a form never once envisaged by my excellent teachers all those years ago.
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Dave-by-the-Sea

There are several added complications. About five years ago I was on the receiving end of a tremendous rocket from a lady in her 70s, who I did not know and to whom I had written as part of some research for one of my books. I knew that her name was (let us say) Mary Smith, so I addressed the envelope to "Mrs M. Smith" and started the letter with "Dear Mary Smith." She did not object to the latter, but the reason for her being so cross was that according to her standards, an envelope was only addressed to a married lady using her own initials if she was a widow, and that if her husband was still alive, as he was in her case, then the initials used had to be those of her husband. In other words, I should have addressed the envelope to her as "Mrs G.A. Smith." I subsequently checked and discovered that according to traditional etiquette she is quite correct.

The other great contemporary complication is the use of Christian names with people one has not met. The modern custom is to go straight into the use of Christian names, but this causes great offence among those of our generation. Unfortunately, the people who do this seem to be so thick-skinned that if one tries to explain this to them, they simply cannot comprehend what the problem is.
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Re: ADDRESSING

Post by AKAP »

petard249 wrote: The other great contemporary complication is the use of Christian names with people one has not met. The modern custom is to go straight into the use of Christian names, but this causes great offence among those of our generation. Unfortunately, the people who do this seem to be so thick-skinned that if one tries to explain this to them, they simply cannot comprehend what the problem is.
Having married into a "Quaker" family. I understand that "Friends"
do not use the terms Mr, Mrs or any other title. Envelopes would therefore be addressed "Mary Smith".
A sensible convention (many ideas from "The Society of Friends" are).
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Post by Great Plum »

I have to agree that the term 'Ms' is extremely ugly...

Talking to the Future Mrs Plum and some of her friends we deduced that the term 'Ms' is used chiefly by feminists and lesbians...
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Post by DavebytheSea »

Great Plum wrote:I have to agree that the term 'Ms' is extremely ugly...

Talking to the Future Mrs Plum and some of her friends we deduced that the term 'Ms' is used chiefly by feminists and lesbians...
.................. and unmarried mistresses?
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Re: ADDRESSING

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petard249 wrote:About five years ago I was on the receiving end of a tremendous rocket from a lady in her 70s, who I did not know and to whom I had written as part of some research for one of my books. I knew that her name was (let us say) Mary Smith, so I addressed the envelope to "Mrs M. Smith" and started the letter with "Dear Mary Smith." She did not object to the latter, but the reason for her being so cross was that according to her standards, an envelope was only addressed to a married lady using her own initials if she was a widow, and that if her husband was still alive, as he was in her case, then the initials used had to be those of her husband. In other words, I should have addressed the envelope to her as "Mrs G.A. Smith." I subsequently checked and discovered that according to traditional etiquette she is quite correct.
... and, David, she was absolutely right! Did we not share the same teachers at Housie? Were we not, indeed, in the same form? So how come you managed to skyve off this particular lesson which was instilled with such certitude?
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Re: ADDRESSING

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petard249 wrote:
The other great contemporary complication is the use of Christian names with people one has not met. The modern custom is to go straight into the use of Christian names, but this causes great offence among those of our generation. Unfortunately, the people who do this seem to be so thick-skinned that if one tries to explain this to them, they simply cannot comprehend what the problem is.
I long ago shrugged off any concerns I had on this score and now mix Christian names with the best of them, writing to Prime Ministers, Bishops, County Councillors and Peers of the realm with "Dear Tony" etc.! After all the name that is given in Baptism is blessed by God and cannot therefore be intrinsically disrespectful! Unlike my good friend petard249, however, I do take care to address the envelope with the proper form.
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Post by shoz »

Interesting that every reply so far has come from a man.
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Post by DavebytheSea »

shoz wrote:Interesting that every reply so far has come from a man.
It is the men who have the difficulties on this score, Shoz. I expect most ladies probably have very few hang-ups about it.
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Post by sejintenej »

DavebytheSea wrote:
shoz wrote:Interesting that every reply so far has come from a man.
It is the men who have the difficulties on this score, Shoz. I expect most ladies probably have very few hang-ups about it.
Pewrhaps profesionally we have always had to get the question right or lose a customer. The matter of how a married / widowed woman is addressed is what I learned and always used. Working on a counter in a bank there was a policy (assuming you didn't know if the female was married or not)

a) look for a ring

it might be hidden so:
- if the famale apppears under 22 then she wants to be married and will be flattered if you address her as Mrs.
- if the female appears over 22 then address her as Miss - she will be flattered that she looks too young to be married and, if married, will wish that she wasn't

I never had any comeback from that but it did apply in the early 60's. these days, anything seems to go, like "Hey, you"

Yes, I also hate Mizzzzzzzz
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Post by Katharine »

I'll come in as a female, speaking ONLY for myself, a married woman of age 58. While I accept some of the conventions over initials that existed in the past, I would like an envelope to be addressed to me as either Mrs K M Dobson or as Katharine Dobson. I do NOT like Mrs Katharine Dobson, even less do I like variants on Mrs John Dobson. Ladies older than myself might not agree with me.

The salutation (is that the word?) in the letter could be Dear Mrs Dobson or Dear Katharine. This does not answer the original query when you do not know the marital status, personally I would go with the given name or Dear Madam, which shows that you do understand the recipient is female.

What I detest and abhor more than anything else is people who only look at the start of my name and not at all of it, Katharine is the spelling closest to the classical Greek, as my Old Blue Dad informed me.
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Post by Mid A 15 »

Katharine wrote:I'll come in as a female, speaking ONLY for myself, a married woman of age 58. While I accept some of the conventions over initials that existed in the past, I would like an envelope to be addressed to me as either Mrs K M Dobson or as Katharine Dobson. I do NOT like Mrs Katharine Dobson, even less do I like variants on Mrs John Dobson. Ladies older than myself might not agree with me.

The salutation (is that the word?) in the letter could be Dear Mrs Dobson or Dear Katharine. This does not answer the original query when you do not know the marital status, personally I would go with the given name or Dear Madam, which shows that you do understand the recipient is female.

What I detest and abhor more than anything else is people who only look at the start of my name and not at all of it, Katharine is the spelling closest to the classical Greek, as my Old Blue Dad informed me.
Thank God I edited my spelling the other day! :wink:
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Post by J.R. »

I object to some of the previous ideas on this matter.

Forget the Mistress and Lesbian soubriquet Plum.

NEITHER of our daughters are married. Our eldest has lived with her partner for well over 14 years and refers to herself as Ms. She would certainly object to being referred to as a 'Mistress', and she certainly isn't a lesbian.

Both their daughters have take the surname of Rutley-Stent, retaining our name as their first surname and their Fathers for the second. This name regularly appears within the sports pages of our local news-paper.

To answer the original question, I try to avoid writing to women as much as possible, but have usually found the best form of address, is, 'To Whom It May Concern'.
John Rutley. Prep B & Coleridge B. 1958-1963.
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DavebytheSea wrote:I long ago shrugged off any concerns I had on this score and now mix Christian names with the best of them, writing to Prime Ministers, Bishops, County Councillors and Peers of the realm with "Dear Tony" etc.!
Great! In that case I challenge you to write a letter starting "Dear Liz" to you-know-who. Meanwhile, I will check on the visiting hours in the Tower of London.
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