[HPforGrownups] Flitwick/Fudge/the Potters

[Cindy Jenkins]

No: HPFGUIDX 91618


----- Original Message ----- 
From: potioncat

What surprises me is that Fudge refers to "James and Lily" several
times as if he had been on a first name basis with them. Oddly
enough, Professors McGonagall and Flitwick refer to James and Sirius
always as Potter and Black.


Me here--
It seems to me that Fudge, as well as McGonagall in SS, refers to "James and
Lily" because they are refering to them as grown-ups.  When McGonagall and
Flitwick are talking about them as kids, they use their last names, as is
their style with the students.  Even with the current students, Hagrid and
Lupin the only two professors I can recall calling Harry by his first name.
It's either Potter, or Mr. Potter.  Once the kids grow up, though, it
wouldn't be unheard of to start using first names, especially if the student
became the teacher's collegue.

I'm in the US, so I don't know if that makes a difference.  I know that
after I graduated, though, it was entirely proper to call my former
teachers--who were Mr., Mrs., or Dr.--by their first names, and they by
mine.

Cindy