Personal pronoun questions

[Khatores]

This is sort of a grammatical, but sort of a cultural issue. I've been trying to learn the various personal pronouns that differ as far as age, marital status, etc. I think I've got a rough idea of when to use which one. However, I'd like to know if there are really any definite rules here.

First off, how many years apart could I be and call a similarly aged person "anh" or "cô"? I'm a notoriously terrible judge of age, so I find the prospect of basing forms of address on my own rough guesses a little daunting. Moreover, some people look younger or older than they really are.

At what point or age does someone's pronoun change? If a parent is 70 and their kid is 50, do they still call them "em", even though most everyone else probably calls them "ông"? When would their title change in regards to the rest of the world...for example, the press, other people who have no idea how old they are, etc? What if I'm writing an email or calling someone?

If I have friends who are older than my parents but not as old as my grandparents, would I call them "ông/bà" or something more informal?

[abc]

Hello Khatores,

In English, you have only You and I for all pronouns. In Vietnamese there are many.

Ông, bà, anh, chị, cô, em, chú, thím ...

In formal contexts, you can use tôi for "I" and ông bà (for old people) and anh, chị (for young people) for "you".

In informal contexts, you can use em, cháu, con for "I" and all others for you.

If I have friends who are older than my parents but not as old as my grandparents, would I call them "ông/bà" or something more informal?

In this case, you will call them "bác" or "cô" (not the cô meaning young lady).

What do you think abour my answer? :)

[Khatores]

In this case, you will call them "bác" or "cô" (not the cô meaning young lady).
How would they know which cô it is, that I'm not calling them a girl? LOL

What do you think abour my answer? :)
Your answer is good, but I'm only in the very beginning stages of understanding Vietnamese pronouns, so it's still confusing.

I don't know understand the uses of chú and thím (never seen those before) or cháu or bác. I thought bá means something like "Mrs.", is it related to bác?

[giang]

Hello.

Welcome abc to VIEX. :) Your answer was good!

To Khatores: The personal pronoun "cô" has different connotations:

(1) Cô is used for a young lady (usually not married, younger than you).

EX: Chào cô Mai! (= Cô is just like "miss")

(2) Cô in educational situations means "is used for a female teacher. It comes from "cô giáo" (female teacher vs. "thầy giáo" as male teacher)

EX (from a student) Em chào cô ạ. (Hello teacher!)

(3) Cô derives from the kinship term "cô" which means "aunt" (younger sister of the FATHER). So "cô" is used to call someone of the approximate age of your mother.

[abc]

Hello giang,

Your explanation is very clear. I wanted to write like this but i did not know how to arrange the ideas.

Anh là giáo viên dạy tiếng Việt à? Nhìn ở thông tin cá nhân, thấy anh học nhiều thứ tiếng quá nhỉ. Anh học cách nào vậy?

ABC guy

[x1]

Well, well! I think I have met up with .... Hehe!!! This world is small and round, indeed!!!

[giang]

Well, well! I think I have met up with .... Hehe!!! This world is small and round, indeed!!!

Hi, X1, do you mean ME or ABC ? If it's a long lost friend, then refresh my memory with a PM ? :)

[x1]

The 'fact' that you are are multilingual and you are located in Pusan, SK, and ... reminds me of someone.... but I am going to leave it there! Haha!!!

[hbae787]

Khatores,

Q. First off, how many years apart could I be and call a similarly aged person "anh" or "cô"? I'm a notoriously terrible judge of age, so I find the prospect of basing forms of address on my own rough guesses a little daunting. Moreover, some people look younger or older than they really are.
A. To be on the safe side, you would call a similar-aged person “ông, bà” (formal), or “anh, chị” (informal).
When you are sure that the woman is younger than you, then “cô”. Be careful with this term though. Many married women consider being addressed as “cô” disrespectful, espescially when they are middle-aged.
Rule-of-thumb : Do not address a forty-something woman “cô” regardless of her marital status, or how older you are than she. Call her “chị” or “bà”.

Q. At what point or age does someone's pronoun change? If a parent is 70 and their kid is 50, do they still call them "em", even though most everyone else probably calls them "ông"? When would their title change in regards to the rest of the world...for example, the press, other people who have no idea how old they are, etc? What if I'm writing an email or calling someone?
A. Parents call their kids “con”, not “em”, no matter how old the kid is. I am fifty myself and my mom and I are on a “mẹ, con” basis.
The tittle change in a rather subtle way. When you become about 30 yrs. old, you are entitled to be called “ông” (Mr.) in public, workplace, and formal occasions. But just like in English, you are not an “ông” to your family and friends. You are still Khatores.
If you are making a call and a male voice answers the phone then the safest way is calling him ông, unless the voice sounds very teenager-like. When writing an email to an unknown-aged male recipient, again just like in English, you must address him as ông.

Q. If I have friends who are older than my parents but not as old as my grandparents, would I call them "ông/bà" or something more informal?
A. “Ông/bà” is appropriate. But “Bác” (for both male and female) would be more personable.

Did I answer your questions ?

[Ern]

Hello hbae787
Thank for a very good discription of personel pronouns. This is the most (for me ) complicated area.
I even have doubts saying hello...so "Xin Chao' does it for me
Even though you have explained it very well, I am always worring about putting my foot in it..(making a fool of myself)
So I take the easy way out :lol: By using the term Xin Chao
But I do notice in the cities, things are becoming less formal. When I am introduced to a Viet male it is usually "This is my friend Ern Marshall" we shake hands and the reply is usualy "Hello Ern my name is So and So"
Becoming more Western every day...which helps me greatly.
For me I think I would have to live in Vietnam for some time before I felt comfortable with personal pronouns
Ern

[ray7ray]

:D Chào các bạn,

This is a great subject for all the English speakers. One of my friends tells me it can be a little confusing even for a native speaker. It is always better to address someone politely first. They will correct you if you are wrong or tell you to address them in a more familiar way.

First of all, Mr. Giang, since we are all students here, how should we be correctly addressing you??? In English: Mr. Giang, or Professor Giang? In Vietnamese: Ông Giang, or Anh Giang, or Thầy Giang, or Thầy?

Question: At what age can a young person ( I guess teenager or young adult) start calling children, con??



I will be honest with everyone here. I am 52 years old. So it has been explained to me as follows (PLEASE CORRECT THIS IF WRONG!! ) :

Remember, the following is for me who is 52 years old:

To whom you don't have blood relationship with:
--From 1-20 years of age: call her/him con or cháu (southern people prefer to call con), call yourself chú if his/her father is older than you, bác if you are older than his/her father.

--From 21-44 years of age: call yourself tôi.
To a lady, call her cô in formal case ( in a business meeting, or for the first time you meet her), call her em if you are acquainted with her already. You should keep calling her cô until she calls herself em to you first.
To a man, call him anh in formal case, otherwise call him cậu or chú (in this case, cậu and chú mean a young man). You can also address them bạn, or chú bạn, or cô bạn.

sometimes you can call yourself anh to a younger person, whom you have a friendly relationship with.

--From 45 (ray's age) to 59 years of age: call yourself tôi.
to a lady call her chị, to a man call him anh. If they are the same age you can call him/her bạn, or by his or her name, or em.

If she or he is a older than you, you would address them chị or anh.

--from 60 to 75 years of age: call yourself cháu or con
To a lady, call her cô or dì if she is younger than your mother, otherwise call her bác. To a man, call him chú if he is younger than your father, otherwise call him bác.

--Over 75 years of age: Call yourself con or cháu. To a lady, call her bà (sometimes bà cô, bà bác). To a man, call him ông ( sometimes ông chú or ông bác).

In a very formal case, always call yourself tôi, call a man ông, and unmarried lady cô, a married or senior lady bà.

To your relatives:

1) mother, call her má or mẹ..........all yourself con
2) father, call him ba or cha..........call yourself con
3) younger sister, call her em or cô.......call yourself anh/or chị
4) younger brother, call him em or chú...........call yourself anh/ or chị
5) older sister, call her chị......call yourself em (guy or girl)
6) older brother, call him anh....call yourself em (guy or girl)
7) niece or nephew, call them con or cháu...call yourself chú
-call yourself bác if she/he is your younger brother's child.
-call yourself cậu if she/he is your sister's child.
-call yourself dương if she is child of your wife's sister/brother.
8) aunt, call her cô....call yourself con or cháu if she is your father's
younger sister.
-Call her dì.....call yourself con or cháu if she is your mother's sister.
-Call her thím...call yourself con or cháu if she is wife of your
father's younger brother.
-Call her mợ....call yourself con or cháu if she is wife of your
mother's younger brother.
-Call her bác....call yourself con or cháu if she is your father's
older sister or wife of your father's older brother.

9) Uncle, call him chú..call yourself con or cháu if he is your father's
younger brother.
-call him cậu...call yourself con or cháu if he is your mother's
younger brother.
-call him dượng....call yourself con or cháu if he is husband of
your mother's sister or brother.
-call him bác...call yourself con or cháu if he is your father's older
brother.
10) Grandmother, call her bà ngoại...call yourself con of cháu if she is
your mother's mother.
-call her bà nội...call yourself con or cháu if she is your father's
mother.
11) Grandfather, call him otng ngoại..call yourself con or cháu if he is
your mother's father.
-call him ông nội ..call yourself con or cháu if he is your father's
father.

How about someone who is younger than me (me- 52 year old guy),
a stranger, but of higher social status or higher education?

Address him/her as ông/bà; or cô if she is quite many years your junior.

If higher educated address him/her by his/her degree of education on the first few encounters. If you and he/she get to know each other better, then address him/her with respect to his/her age as the answers above.

How about a woman who you hardly know, who is married, but younger than you? (for me, a guy) address her as cô or thím.

How about a woman you know who's married, younger than you but you know her and her family. Address her the way you did before she was married.

Wow!!! It can get complicated, right?!! Also there are exceptions to many things.

Did I completely bore everyone?? :cry:

Có ai cảm thấy buồn ngủ không ????

[giang]

Hi Ray7ray

Thanks for the long but interesing post.
First of all, Mr. Giang, since we are all students here, how should we be correctly addressing you??? In English: Mr. Giang, or Professor Giang? In Vietnamese: Ông Giang, or Anh Giang, or Thầy Giang, or Thầy?

As not all of VIEX members are EV students, people can call me just Mr. Giang. In Vietnamese, it depends on whom. You can call me Anh Giang until you start to learn something from me. In that case, it would be Thầy Giang.

To whom you don't have blood relationship with:
--From 1-20 years of age: call her/him con or cháu (southern people prefer to call con), call yourself chú if his/her father is older than you, bác if you are older than his/her father.

Correct, but you can call yourself bác if your think his/her parents are younger than you.

--From 21-44 years of age: call yourself tôi.
To a lady, call her cô in formal case ( in a business meeting, or for the first time you meet her), call her em if you are acquainted with her already. You should keep calling her cô until she calls herself em to you first.
To a man, call him anh in formal case, otherwise call him cậu or chú (in this case, cậu and chú mean a young man). You can also address them bạn, or chú bạn, or cô bạn.
sometimes you can call yourself anh to a younger person, whom you have a friendly relationship with.
Excellent !


--From 45 (ray's age) to 59 years of age: call yourself tôi.
to a lady call her chị, to a man call him anh. If they are the same age you can call him/her bạn, or by his or her name, or em.

If she or he is a older than you, you would address them chị or anh.

Yes, off course for 99%. however, at ray's age, it's difficult to call people of your age bạn. It's rather for young people. Call them anh. chị or ông, bà (and call yourself tôi). In VN, people also call their friends ông or bà, but they are not the formal ông, bà.


--from 60 to 75 years of age: call yourself cháu or con
To a lady, call her cô or dì if she is younger than your mother, otherwise call her bác. To a man, call him chú if he is younger than your father, otherwise call him bác.
--Over 75 years of age: Call yourself con or cháu. To a lady, call her bà (sometimes bà cô, bà bác). To a man, call him ông ( sometimes ông chú or ông bác).

Very very exact !


In a very formal case, always call yourself tôi, call a man ông, and unmarried lady cô, a married or senior lady bà.

Yes, but you can call chị a married lady, too.