the questions of our times: formality and vampires

[rm]

This, thanks to a discussion started by weirdquark. Please do visit the comments where you will learn many things including the many ways formality is structured in different languages (something my questions did not fully take into account, and I apologize for that), werewolf pack dynamics considerations, and whether there are vampires in France.

[Poll #1601631]

Comments

[trinker.livejournal.com]

Japanese native speaker -

Avoid use of pronouns. Default to the stranger-polite level.

Why are you talking to the vamp/etc anyway? Roles in play trump any other consideration.

[crazysoph.livejournal.com]

Hello Trinker!

Just riffing on the Japanese (for the others reading, I'm merely studying it, and not doing very well at that...) to vampires - stranger-polite but without too much humble/honorific? (or, honorific but avoiding humble, unless the speaker was placing him/herself explicitly in a servile position to the vampire? Would that be a one-way trip, or could that be adapted - used in a moment to diffuse tension, dropped when the general situation was more relaxed...)

Thanks for letting me put this bug in your ear! :)

Crazy(and probably going to be thinking about this question now as I drift off to sleep...)Soph

[trinker.livejournal.com]

Something like that...the sort of formal one uses for a shopkeeper is what I was thinking.

But we have a meme-clash going on anyway, as vamps aren't Japanese supernaturals, and Japanese supernaturals masquerade as ordinary humans of some sort, or as clearly not-humans, which get a different sort of speech.

Or so I recall. I haven't read any Japanese supernatural stories intended for adults.

[crazysoph.livejournal.com]

Looking up such stories might well be a future port-of-call for me, then. :)

Crazy(and now? my fevered-overly active imagination is trying to wonder if a modern Japanese-turned vamp would say "itadakimasu" before biting... help. make. it. STOP! ;) )Soph

[trinker.livejournal.com]

*bellylaugh*

Thanks, Soph. I've missed seeing your explorations into Japanese.