Rule or Guide?

[Birchy]

What is etiquette? Can anybody strictly say that setting a table, RSVP-ing in writing or a multitude of other stuff has a wrong and/or a right method? Taking into account cultural differences - for example - "etiquette" must surely be vague, at best?

[rekstout]

I was always taught that etiquette is what "should" be done and protocol was what "must" be done. i.e etiquette is a guide, protocol is a rule

[incitatus]

Etiquette does not transcend cultures. It is by definition what is considered the norm WITHIN a culture. Who decides is a debatable subject. People who write books on it, I suppose, as with any consensus. Etiquette is a vague term.....but then everything is in Humanities.

[indobrit]

As with so much else in English, "�tiquette" is a French word - its original (and still current) meaning in French is "label"; I am unsure of how it came ot mean "polite behaviour" in both English and French. Etiquette arises from a generally uncodified consensus within a society as to what does and does not constitue acceptable behaviour. It can vary hugely in intensity and application, from the relative informality of Northern and Western Europe, South Africa, Australasia, Canada, and the USA, to the relatively constrained behaviour in the Indian sub-continent plus Afghanistan and Iran (with constitute a socio-linguistic continuum of sorts), the Islamic lands, the people of the Congo and Niger valleys... the list is endless. "Protocol" comes from a Greek word, "prot�kollon" (a neuter noun, stress on the first "o" - the first is an "omega", and the other two are "omicrons"). It has two meanings in Greek: (a) a register of correspondence, and (b) behaviour current at court and in diplomatic circles. Thus, it could be argued that protocol is a special aspect of etiquette.

[Birchy]

Would it be etiquette to say "Crikey!!!!!" to Indobrit?

[incitatus]

I'm sure that crikey would be appreciated. Possibly corks, too.

[Ginbottle]

Etiquette is personal & protocol is corporate. As in the Queen being pushed on her elbow by an Australian in 1980.