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Laws of Address: The Impact of the Practice and Words of Address on Our Civil, Political, and Social Lives
Brooks, Richard
Brooks, Richard
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Abstract
In this Article I argue that the practice of individuals
addressing others, who in turn answer or otherwise respond when
addressed, contributes distinctively to what it means to be a
person in society with others. When uttered aloud, terms of
address and reference announce correlative entitlements running
between speakers and their audiences. These conventionally
spoken terms pervasively coordinate individuals in their everyday
interactions with others. Moreover, in the practice of addressing
others, speakers make claims of legitimacy and demands for
compliance. As such, addressing someone is a sign of authority,
like wearing a badge or a crown or any observable sign that can be
used as a focal point for effective coordination. Yet, in our social
lives the practice of address goes beyond strategic or rational
coordination, reaching to the core of what it means to be a person
in society with others. It touches on our uniquely human capacity
for evaluative self-reflection; some measure of dignity,
degradation or other sense of self often emerges when even the
most banal honorific or humilific is offered, or denied.
Consequently, the practice of address is a subject of extensive
social and emotional regulation, as well as, law and legal
regulation-the topic of this Article, which focuses principally on
what is deemed the first law of address.