So it’s summer (yippee!) which means sleeping in, getting back to a regular gym routine, getting into the office after 9am and leaving at or before 4pm, working on grants, working on long-overdue papers, playing music really loud with my office door open, etc.
But summer is also the time to catch up on those pesky regular medical check ups. You know the ones ... routine annual physical (which I had done during the work up for the ablation), annual mammogram (thanks to last year’s scare and the family history), dentist, eye exam, and so on.
So I had a routine eye exam mostly because I suspected that I needed a new prescription for my glasses. After chatting with the assistant about life and stuff, the eye guy walks in, calls me PiT and then introduces himself as Dr Eye Guy.
Hmmmm. I was tempted to ask him to call me Dr PiT but had to refrain as I knew he would be putting stinging drops in my eyes and shining lasers and stuff into them. Not someone I could afford to piss off at that moment.
At no point in my post-PhD life have I ever introduced myself as Dr PiT. It’s just not something I would ever think to do. My students call me Dr PiT but that’s because it’s a departmental policy and I don’t require that anyone in my lab do this (I actually request that they don’t).
I don’t even know why this bugged me so much, but it did.
If I ever had to introduce myself to anyone as Dr PiT, I’m not sure I could keep a straight face. I have enough trouble telling people I’m a professor because it sounds really wanky.*
Someone suggested I introduce myself as Her Royal Highness PiT.
I think that’s what I’m going to do from now on.
* Wanky: Indulgent, pretentious, simultaneously showy and useless.
Mentoring Madness
3 hours ago
My feeling has always been that the context of the meeting is really key to how one introduces themself.
ReplyDeleteIE: when you are in your professional setting (teaching, writing official correspondance, etc.), it makes sense to introduce yourself as Dr PiT. But when you are in a non-professional setting (meeting a new neighbour, or at the optometrist), your title is not particularly relevant.
Same goes for the Eye Doc. When he is in his own professional setting he should address himself as Dr Eye Doc. If the optometrist happened to be your new neighbour introducing himself on the porch, I would find it odd if he called himself Dr. EyeDoc.
The same goes for other official titles (Rev, etc) - reminds me of the Seinfeld episode about the Maestro...
I'm kind of similar, that I find it sounding ridiculous to introduce myself as Dr Pika, so I ususally don't and in most cases I don't think it really matters.
ReplyDeleteHowever, there is one exception where I found it very handy - whenever I am dealing with any kind of medical professional, particularly doctors. Maybe this is because I am an immigrant with a non-native name - so if I just introduce myself by name name, the common reaction is that they assume I don't really speak native language very well and they talk to me as if I was a 5 year old child. Which I find very irritating. If, however, I bring up the Dr part, then they immediately start treating me as an equal and explain things properly.
i want to live in the UK where i can strive for earning the title Dame. Dr Dame Endurance Meg. :)
ReplyDeleteLiz is probably right, but I agree with you it is annoying... The only time I could not resist introducing myself as Dr. Patchi was when a salesman was calling me Patchi while introducing himself as Dr. Joe. I just had to title back!
ReplyDeleteMy students often say : "Thanks man" because I am not that much older than them. I actually like that and take it as a compliment :D
ReplyDeleteAB
My litmus test for uppity doctors, who ask me if it's Mrs. or Miss, is to fire back "It's Dr. X, but you can call me FirstName." If the doc flinches, then I find another doctor.
ReplyDelete