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Michael Schwarz: The Changing Uses of du

Actually I say du only to people who are my age, and even if older people offer to use du, I don't like it so much. I'd rather use Sie. To me it's somehow more proper or polite. Somehow if you use du with someone older, it's intimate in a way that you really cannot be with someone older. You're really more intimate, more private in conversations with people of the same age than with adults. I don't know anyone older with whom I can talk in such a private way. Even then, I think Sie is better. There are a lot of people who use du with older people. I've always turned it down. I don't know. Normally you don't refuse it, but I do. I don't like it. Sie is more comfortable. You retain more of yourself. If you use du with someone, then it's supposed to become very private, and when you keep the Sie, it's easier to keep your boundaries: this far and no further, for example, if you want to talk about something private, about your family or what concerns you. For example, when you see former teachers with whom you really got along and they offer to use du after two or three years when you are twenty and aren't in school anymore, I--and also two or three other friends--have always turned down the offer, because our teacher was so important to us that we almost didn't want to use du, and because he was our authority, and he was something like a wise man. So we thought it was better to retain the use of Sie. It's respect, when you use Sie, I find. It was the same way in sport organizations with trainers. The others used du. I used Sie with them because it shows more authority or respect.