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[case_insensitive]

Not something I ever saw or heard of in my colleges. If I was a woman I'd have permanently clenched teeth around here trying not to scream.

Thank you for being perceptive, Dr. Mrhistory!

Isn't it awful that you want to thank me, and that I'd understand why?  BTW, the title is just the tip of the iceberg here in terms of "gender climate."   But, on that subject, my view is that coming to college requires so many new things to be learned. This is one of them---why should this be dismissed? And worse, excused as "cultural?"  Its rudeness.

bingo!

i'm lucky that in most ways my current place of employment is fantastic, so I do feel for your colleague.  i'm so glad i'm no longer working in a place like that.  however, the student climate with regard to gender is clearly somewhere in the ice ages at times!

[tonyrock]

Hm. I teach in the fine and commercial arts, so have earned only a lowly Masters Degree. Also, I'm short and young looking. What should my students call me? All the other art teachers are called by their first names- should I make my students call me Mastress naomin?

[infopri]

Hm. I teach in the fine and commercial arts, so have earned only a lowly Masters Degree. Also, I'm short and young looking. What should my students call me? All the other art teachers are called by their first names- should I make my students call me Mastress naomin?

What's wrong with Professor?

[case_insensitive]

Hm. I teach in the fine and commercial arts, so have earned only a lowly Masters Degree. Also, I'm short and young looking. What should my students call me? All the other art teachers are called by their first names- should I make my students call me Mastress naomin?

You should ask them to call you whatever it is that you want to be called.

For the fiona, this would be Your Majesty.

[mrhistory]

Hm. I teach in the fine and commercial arts, so have earned only a lowly Masters Degree. Also, I'm short and young looking. What should my students call me? All the other art teachers are called by their first names- should I make my students call me Mastress naomin?

What about Professor?  I'm assuming that this is your academic rank. If not, Ms. or Mr. Naomin would see appropriate no matter your age or appearance.   If the local standard is first-name-friendliness, however, likely that is what you are going to have to live with.

Here in Happy Valley U, first name use is frowned upon even for advanced dissertators which is a new one for me. But, I'm untenured so I go with the jealously guarded standard of maintaing that bright line between the newly appointed and our final-semester abd (sigh)

[infopri]

Not something I ever saw or heard of in my colleges. If I was a woman I'd have permanently clenched teeth around here trying not to scream.

Thank you for being perceptive, Dr. Mrhistory!

Isn't it awful that you want to thank me, and that I'd understand why?  BTW, the title is just the tip of the iceberg here in terms of "gender climate."   But, on that subject, my view is that coming to college requires so many new things to be learned. This is one of them---why should this be dismissed? And worse, excused as "cultural?"  Its rudeness.

This actually is symptomatic of something bigger, IMHO.  I think I'll start a new thread, so as not to hijack this one.

[drsyn]

I tell the students to call me by my first name or Dr. Syn.

Some call me Miss, my favorite was the international student who called me 'Mum.'

Most students call me Dr., though many call me teacher - it's a cultural thing.

What I find really irritating is that some of my colleagues want all of us, even faculty, to call them Dr.

[no_longer_surprised]

The quotation you remember resembles this one:

I [was] unable to understand why education is the one product
from which the consumer does not want to get his money's worth.

Erik Rosenthal, The Calculus of Murder, Chapter 9

[athena1]

Ugh, back on the Ms/Mrs/Dr topic! This drives me nuts. I would rather they call me by my first name than Mrs or Ms Happybut! Today, a student who had me all last semester, during which I signed numerous emails "Dr H" said hu took this class because "I like Mrs. Happybut so much" AHHHHHHHHHHHH!

[fiona]

Yes! yes!

Her Majesty The Fiona

You should ask them to call you whatever it is that you want to be called.

For the fiona, this would be Your Majesty.

[iomhaigh]

Campus culture here at overly-polite-slac is Dr. Lastname or Professor Lastname, but I have had numerous colleagues tell me that they all secretly want to be "cool enough" to have the students call them by their first names.  Seems many of them are jealous of the fine arts faculty who do manage to get students to call us by our first names.  The theory is that few of my other fine arts colleagues have Ph.Ds as terminal degrees, so they are able to convince the students to dispense with the titles.  Personally, I think the students have learned that taking the time to holler "Professor Long-and-hyphenated-last-name watch your back" makes the difference between skewering your prof with a stick of lumber and not. 

I love when I circle the "Mrs. Iomhaigh" on their papers and write "not yet" and then get the next round of papers with "Mrs. Firstname Iomhaigh."

But, anything is better than the emails in which a former student kept referring to me as "Hey b**ch, I need you to cut me some slack on this." Same student titled one of her classmates "d***ebag" on a peer evaluation form.  She's getting some help, I am happy to report. 

[infopri]

Campus culture here at overly-polite-slac is Dr. Lastname or Professor Lastname, but I have had numerous colleagues tell me that they all secretly want to be "cool enough" to have the students call them by their first names.  Seems many of them are jealous of the fine arts faculty who do manage to get students to call us by our first names. 

At my grad school (not in fine arts), the faculty and doctoral students (and most of the master's students) were on a first-name basis.  Most faculty, however, remained Dr./Prof. to the undergraduates.  It seemed to work for everyone.

When I started working full-time at StateU, most of the (undergraduate students) were content to call me Professor.  I found that I did not want them calling me by my first name, which is odd because I have never liked titles, my own or others'.  My friends' children call me FirstName, not Ms. LastName (or worse, Mrs. Husband'sLastName).  I hate that my sister taught her son to call me Aunt FirstName, instead of just FirstName (and I can't seem to break him of the habit).  Etc.  But from undergraduates, FirstName just didn't feel right.

[slac_vap]

But, anything is better than the emails in which a former student kept referring to me as "Hey b**ch, I need you to cut me some slack on this." <snip>  She's getting some help, I am happy to report. 

!

Presumably, help for her meth addiction?

[slac_vap]

I hate that my sister taught her son to call me Aunt FirstName, instead of just FirstName (and I can't seem to break him of the habit).  Etc.  But from undergraduates, FirstName just didn't feel right.

Infopri, what is it that bothers you about being called Aunt FirstName?  I don't see "Aunt" as a title so much as a modifier that serves the purpose of reinforcing family bonds.  I don't know how old your nephew is, but I would guess your sister started the whole Aunt FirstName thing to teach him about family and to denote the special place you have in his life.  I'm curious whether you prefer to suspend other family terms (Mom, Dad...) as well?  If you eventually were to have grandkids, would you prefer FirstName to Grandma?

[bibliothecula]

I've never been called "Aunt" by nieces, and it would grate to me. I don't use "Aunt" or "Uncle" for my own relatives, either. The grandchildren of my parents call them by their first names, at my parents' request. My brothers and I do call our parents (we have differnet mothers) by "Mom" and "Dad" when we're talking to them, but when we're all alone and refer to them, we all use first names to make it clear exactly whose parent we're talking about.

I can understand why some people use the honorific/label "Aunt So-and-so," but I personally don't like it. Just my $0.02.