prof-student etiquitte + Potions master stuff (was: Re: Master of This School)

[annegirl11 at juno.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 111844

Kathryn:
>  'please sir, the Chemistry master wanted me to give you this message'

Aura:
This is another one of those UK private school culture clash things:
whenever Hermione says "Please sir," to ask a question, I'm reminded of
"may I have some more?" and abused ophans and whatnot. :) To my American
ears, it seems like an unnecesarily subserviant thing for Hermione to
say, so I assume I'm missing some cultural context here? 

Edis:
>Teachers with departmental responsibility in those days would be 
>called 'The Latin Master' or 'Geography Master' or 'Chemistry Master' 
>or whatever.

So it *is* a title of sorts that connotes a ranking above just "teacher."
Perhaps somethign to do with Snape being house head of Slytherine? Having
the title "master" means you're qualified to be the head of a house? 

Am I the only one who, whenever Snape says "Potions master", mentally
adds, "-bater"? Because he's just so lonely and pathetic. I still say that he
invokes that title just to puff up his importance, because he's so insecure
he feels he needs external things like titles to make people respect his
authority.

Aura

~*~
Well that's a horse of a different color.
Fanfic and original stuff at www.homepage-host.uni.cc/w/ofnone

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