to prefer 'What'? to 'Pardon?'

[wolfhound]

although neither of them are very good. 'Pardon?' sounds a bit Hyacinth Bucket IMO, and 'What?' can sound rude.
What do you teach your DCs to say?
DS1 (3.5) seems to have adopted his own style of bellowing 'Can you say that a bit louder?' which may not be the ideal long term style.

both are better than the ugh? that DD has taken to

I say 'sorry?'. I'm not sure if this is lower, middle or upper middle class or some other odd combination, I lose track. I do hate 'pardon?' though especially if it's pronounced 'puddun?' as it inevitably is around here. 'What?' is OK if it's not pronounced 'Whuuuuuh?'

What sounds ignorant. Pardon is much better although I mostly go for a "sorry?". I had the 'pardon' conversation with dd only this very morning.

DD says 'Eh?' about 10000 times a day. We've taken to ignoring her unless shes 'what?'.
Worst thing is 'Pardon' pronounced as 'Parr - den'.

we say "sorry"? in this house and we are ultra middle middle class.

I say it the French way

If in eg job interview 'sorry, could you say that again please' is reasonable alternative to 'what'.

LOL at Katisha - but I agree. My dcs had to learn to be bilingual - the school seems to insist on "pardon" and "toilet". No matter how daft it may be, these words make me cringe, so they are banned at home. Which means that DS likes to use them lots. Just to see me wince.

I was horrified to hear myself saying 'we don't say toilet in this house' the other day.

I hate saying 'what' instead of pardon and have always taught my dc's to say pardon. What to me sounds rude and abrupt.

YANBU

I agree that 'what' can sound rude to some people (the ones who say pardon), but I use it, always have done and it's what is normal to me.

what ends up sounding like a grunt with youngters these days - I was brought up to say pardon and get my DNs to say this!

What is it with MN today and all the questions about words? U and non-U was just made up by one of the Mitfords. What makes them qualified to say that one word is better than another? You can understand the words. As I said on another thread, let's just revel in the fact that English has such a large vocabulary.

I think pardon sounds much nicer, you can say it in a normal accent without it sounding like mrs bucket!

We say 'sorry?' in this house. Or 'what'.

Was raised to never say pardon. Made my mother wince.

"was horrified to hear myself saying 'we don't say toilet in this house' the other day."

I distinctly remember the day that the then 5 year old ds2 was bored at the grandparental tea table and chose to wind the assembled company up - always an easy task since (former) MIL existed in a state of high umbrage.

So on being asked to "pass me a serviette, please" ds2 promptly piped up (like Little Lord Fucking Fauntleroy) "I think you mean napkin, Nana. Serviette is a very common word". Git.

"Pardon" sounds sarcastic to me. It reminds me of my parents saying it to me after I'd said something bad and just prior to getting a roasting.

I actually prefer (and use) "uh?", not really a voiced word just a kind of noise....

I hate "what" - or "wot??" as it's said around here (usually shouted 3-4 times...)

Ugh. Like nails on a blackboard.

"Pardon" is bourgeois isn't it. "What" is much more aristocratic.

I tend to say "sorry?" myself.

I don't think I could say "Pardon" without a shiver, though ....

I say what, dd says what. I'm not sorry or excusing myself. Actually dd says 'what did you say?'

Or more correctly at home we say 'eh whatty what what' which probably means little to all but a few people.

SIL says to DN: "don't say what, say pardon."
I say to DCs: "don't say pardon, say what."

Is this how family rifts are caused?

I say "Sorry?". Can't stand "Pardon?".

but Sorry still means you're apologising for the other person not making themselves heard - how is it your fault?