Des deux côtés, les étudiants s’accordent sur le fait qu’être impoli est lié au fait de ne penser qu’à soi et pas aux autres ni à ce qu’ils ressentent. Les élèves de l’ENSEIRB mettent cependant plus en avant l’importance du manque d’éducation, l’absence de respect en général et les détails comme le fait de dire bonjour ou non.

I agree with Julien that it appears the students from ENSEIRB put more emphasis on lack of education and not saying hello as being rude. In the U. S., I think you’re only expected to say hello if you know someone. I’m curious to know from the ENSEIRB students, how well do you need to know someone for you to be expected to say hello?
My initial thought concerning the lack of education idea is that it refers to the fact that rude people lack social education, so they are ignorant, as opposed to lacking formal academic education. However, I’m not sure if this is what lack of education means in this context.
I also thought it was interesting that the MIT students mentioned feelings a lot, whereas they were never mentioned by ENSEIRB students. Perhaps the comments about feelings are just another way to say disrespect.

I see that students from both schools generally mention similar concepts such as insults, manners, and other people. As Julien mentioned, it’s interesting to see that ENSEIRB students mention “not saying hello” a lot whereas MIT students mention it once, but they give a lot of different examples like not holding the door, not saying excuse me, etc. This is obviously due the fact that “social norms” differ in the U. S. and France, but both sides respect them. Like Julia, I’m also curious what ENSEIRB students mean by “éduqué”? I thought they were referring to social education. Are they referring to academic or social education, or both? Do they think there is a correlation between the two? It’s also interesting to see that ENSEIRB side mentions respect a lot more than the MIT side. This might be because it’s a more apparent concept in French culture as saying goes “La liberté des uns s’arrête là où commence celle des autres.”

After reading our previous responses about individualism, I found it interesting how much the MIT students’ perception of “rudeness” had to do with afronts to our own individualism. “doesn’t listen”, “ignores”, “puts themselves first”, “does not care how others feel” are all actions that suppress the individualism of others, yet at the same time could be considered harmful traits of individualists. We only praise individualism insofar as it doesn’t impact the individualism of others. I feel like these beliefs are reflected a lot in American forms of government (Lockean Theory, pursuit of happiness, bill of rights, … etc). How come these types of responses do not appear on the ENSEIRB side? Is it because French culture is more community oriented?

Pour répondre à Julia, en général, il peut nous arriver de dire “Bonjour” à des gens que nous ne connaissons pas mais à qui on a affaire même brièvement. Par exemple on ne dira pas “Bonjour” à chaque personne qu’on croise dans la rue (même si cela se fait parfois encore dans les petits villages), mais il est normal de le dire au boulanger, au caissier ou à la caissière en magasin, ou même parfois à la personne à côté de qui on s’assoit dans le bus…. Je pense que c’est quelque chose qui se fait de moins en moins envers un parfait inconnu, mais qui reste une norme à respecter lorsqu’on à affaire à quelqu’un.
De plus, je pense que “éduqué” ici fait référence à l’éducation sociale comme le pensait sule, c’est-à-dire l’éducation de l’enfant par ses parents qui lui inculquent les normes et les valeurs qu’il doit intégrer pour s’intégrer dans la société. Par contre, je ne sais pas si l’éducation liée au domaine académique aurait également une influence sur le fait d’être plus ou moins poli(e). Je n’en suis pas personnellement convaincu, mais j’aimerais également avoir votre avis sur la question.
Enfin, je pense que les réponses de sule et de tonyproll se rejoignent sur le concept d’individualisme et de respect. En effet, comme le dit sule, “la liberté des uns s’arrête là où commence celle des autres”. Cela signifie alors que l’individualiste ne pensera qu’à sa propre liberté sans forcément respecter celle de l’autre qui traduira ce comportement comme un manque de respect. Individualisme, manque de politesse et de respect peuvent donc être très liés, je comprends donc mieux pourquoi les réponses ont souvent un rapport avec l’individualisme et le respect.

Julien’s response about saying hello to people is interesting to me because I think the same social rules for saying hello do exist in certain parts of the U. S. However, in other parts, particularly the Northeast (New York, Boston, Philadelphia, etc.), we don’t often speak to people unless we anticipate making conversation or asking a question. Do social rules vary from region to region in France? For example, are there regions where people tend to be friendlier?

As mentioned above, students from ENSEIRB seem to associate rudeness more with having bad manners and being impolite, whereas MIT students mention acts that specificly deal with one’s feelings and personality. For example, answers such as “not caring about others’ feelings” are often mentioned on the MIT side, but the idea may be too personal for people of other cultures, especially when rudeness is often attributed to strangers rather than people known at a deeper level.

I found Julien’s discussion of the term “éduqué” quite interesting, largely because we don’t have the same expectation of parents teaching their children to be polite. Certainly, we expect a parent to correct a rude child, but I think we expect most of the rules of courtesy to be learned through interactions, in my experience. The question was also raised of whether academic education has an influence on being more or less polite. In my experience at MIT compared to my hometown, which is in a fairly uneducated region, the courtesy I see is about the same. Educated students at MIT tend to be more familiar with formal rules of courtesy, but they can also be less humble or thoughtful. Again, this is just one person’s experience, so I would be interested to here what others have to say on this subject.

I think actually that Americans have a similar level of polite/respectful interaction with strangers. At least in the Boston area, we do not say hello to strangers in the street, but at the grocery store, or convenience store, etc., we often do say “Hi. How are you doing?” I think in that respect, the MIT and ENSEIRB students actually have a similar idea of what it is to be polite or rude.

I think the way we greet others in our respective cultures should be considered when discussing rude people not saying hi. Here in the US, a simple wave and smile, or actually saying “hi”, can be how one greets when you run into the other person. However, back home, like in France, the norm is to greet everyone with a kiss on the cheek… if I’m not mistaken, it is two kisses in most parts of France. In my culture, if you are friends with the person, or they are family, your friends’ parents, parents’ friends, etc., you always greet with a kiss on the cheek. And if you avoid doing this, it is not taken very lightly. On the other hand, if you don’t really know the person but have met them before or have mutual friends, from my experience, greeting with the kiss can work in your favor. If you greet the person with a kiss rather than just a simple wave, you are considered to be very kind and thoughtful for having taken the time to greet the person; if you don’t greet with the kiss and just wave, nothing really happens and life goes on. It is interesting to see the differences between these cultural norms and understanding their importance on the impressions we make of others. In France, do you always greet others with a kiss, and if so, how do others react if you don’t greet with the kiss?

Growing up, I’ve had a different experience than Collin. In my home, my parents, especially my mom, enforced societal expectations in the household and taught us the rules of politesse that way. We were expected to follow the rules when in public, following them during interactions and not necessarily learning the rules from them. However, my mom is an immigrant and did not grow up in the US, but in China, where the rules of etiquette are also different than those in the US or in France. In fact, I have some social rules ingrained in me that aren’t very strong in American culture. This has led to having a set of two slightly different values that can conflict sometimes. Does anyone else have a similar experience with immigrant parents where the social rules that you learned are slightly different than the culture in which you grew up in?

It’s interesting that within America there are so many different standards of politeness. I’m from the South, where it’s considered normal to use “sir” and “ma’am” when speaking to people you don’t know very well, like cashiers or schoolteachers. In Boston that would come across as weirdly formal. As a result of such discrepancies, many people from my hometown who’d visited the Northeast warned me that I would think everyone in Boston was rude! I didn’t find that to be the case; it was clear that the rules were just different. I wonder what other regional differences people have experienced in America and France.

To answer Jess, I’ve also had an upbringing in which values that aren’t necessarily very “American” have been instilled in me. For me, from my parents who are from Mexico, this includes values similar to the French, such as the rules of politesse. One particular thing that is very similar is the ever-so-important hello. Also, to respond to Collin’s comment, my personal experience, also split between MIT and the urban area of Boston and a rural area (of the American South), politeness and social intelligence does not correlate positively with formal education and many times seems to even be negatively correlated, if anything. Regardless, I think from a varied experience of different parts of the United States, I can see that in general rules of politeness are not as strongly or uniformly held beliefs in the United States as they seem to be in France.

Pour répondre au commentaire de Julia, oui, je pense que dans certaines villes les gens ont tendance à être plus aimables que dans d’autres. Je pense que dans les grandes villes telles que Paris, les gens ont tendance à être submergés par le stress, ce qui les rendrait moins aimables. Au contraire, dans les petites villes ou du moins dans les villes où le stress est moins visible, les gens arrivent plus facilement à s’ouvrir aux autres.

It seems to me, based off of the responses from Alexis and Alex, that the cultures of politeness in both the US and France have some relation to urban and rural areas. Why is that so? Is there a historic reason?

I agree with Alex that in big cities, people tend to just pass by each other without saying hello. He says this might be due to the different levels of stress in different places, whereas Julia was referring to more of a cultural difference in different states/regions.

Responding to Jess, I think the difference in politeness between urban and rural settings has more to do with levels of anonymity and familiarity. In a large, densely populated city, there is much less of chance you will recognize someone as you walk down the streets or go on public transportation. Therefore one might not care very much to say hi or smile to a stranger given that it is so common to see someone you don’t know. On the other hand, in a town that is less populated, the probability of recognizing someone is much higher and therefore a friendlier attitude is maintained much longer and more accentuated even with people you might not recognize. Definitely, there are other factors that come into play and influence friendliness and politeness in cities vs. in small towns, such as the levels of stress in different places and others.

Je remarque que pour les étudiants du MIT l’accent est beaucoup mis sur le respect, alors que les étudiants de l’Enseirb parlent beaucoup du “bonjour” qui est un mot français pour marquer la considération pour la personne que l’on rencontre. Pour moi la marque le plus importante est celle du “Merci” .