to address a woman in a formal letter as "Ms"?

[twattock]

Here's the problem; as a solicitor the formal way to address correspondence is "Dear sirs/your faithfully" or "Dear (insert as appropriate)/yours sincerely". But I often have to write to a woman without knowing what title she has given herself-so do I use Ms? I dont want to assume anything obviously, so I can't use Miss or Mrs, so what would people prefer?

PS. Do we even want to open the can of worms that is 'what to call a female [British] surgeon'? ...

My cousin is a British female surgeon. She's Mrs.

Interesting about Gone with the Wind - I think that is spot on, that it's about people wanting to know the dividing line.

Pamela in Pamela is referred to as "Mrs" IIRC, in spite of being unmarried and still a virgin. That's, um,

When in doubt always use Ms.

That would have been normal - Mrs is just an abbreviation of 'mistress' and calling someone 'mistress' is respectful if you're talking about a woman of a certain age and status.

Even into the early twentieth century, you'd get women who were housekeepers at posh houses, who would be 'mrs' whether married or not, as a mark of respect to their status.

It just struck me as interesting in Pamela because she doesn't have much age or status - in the normal course of things she might have worked her way up to housekeeper, but she's a 15yo lady's maid. Although I suppose that's a couple of steps up from housemaid.

Ahh, but she is so genteel, innit. I can't remember what she gets called in Shamela but it might be different. I'll check.

Yeah ... in Shamela the title has her as 'Mrs' but Mrs Jervis's letters refer to 'Miss Sham'.

I'm a Mrs, but I don't mind either Mrs or Ms. I absolutely hate being called Miss, it's almost like someone talking down to you like you're a child.

I always just cross out the dreaded Ms and put in Mrs...and another thing,I hate it when you go to a hospital or similar and straightaway,you are called by your Christian name

DrJohnson - I was once talking to a partner who used to get emails addressed to 'Dear Lady and Gentlemen', which I think is in some ways even worse. They know that there is a female partner, but they are damn well going to highlight it's only the one!

I'd use "Ms" too. I'm a married Ms.

Ridiculous that we have to differentiate based on our marital status. All adult women should be "Mrs" in the same way that all adult men are "Mr".

DrJohnson I don't understand why people can't use 'Messieurs/ -dames'. This is what also used to happen where I worked in France. It's a plural, and doesn't sound as weird as 'Madams'.

I think it's rather elegant and covers all bases

Tolliver & LRD it was really common in the C18th for servants to use 'Mrs' amongst themselves as a sign of respect. The master would then call you Pamela, or, if you were more senior, Andrews--like the Bennets' housekeeper in Pride & Prejudice gets called 'Hill'.

Yeah, I know. I think the Shamela thing is Fielding taking the piss, the same way he spells virtue 'vartue', is all. Which might perhaps suggest that there was already the same sense of potential for a put-down by using a title like that.

I always use Ms, when I was a young child I was always a bit about why you could tell a women's marital status from their title and not from a man's. I'm married but use my maiden name so it particularly annoys me when people refer to me as Mrs maiden name. Also quite often irritated when people ask my title and when I say Ms, choose to call me Miss often commenting how horrible Ms is.

I work for a family mediation firm, we use Miss if the client appears to be unmarried, or Ms if that's how they're named on the referral form. Only for the first letter mind,once they've met a mediator letters are addressed to first names unless they ask them not to be. My mother is always addressed as Ms in professional contexts, she didn't take my dad's name at marriage, because she was known professionally by her maiden name.

In a month's time, I will be promoted to be the first female partner in a particular office of my law firm. I have always thought nothing of the convention of using "Dear Sirs" when writing firm to firm in contentious matters, seeing it as standard legal shorthand for "dear lawyers at x firm" without any inference of gender (cf Amanda's comment that all US lawyers, male and female, are addressed as "esq.")

However this thread has made me think again. Perhaps we should send a circular to all our opponent firms and tell them that henceforth we must be addressed as "Dear Sirs and Madam". That will set me off on the right foot with my new partners!

Personally, I don't think it is offensive to be addressed "Dear Jessie" by someone whom I have never met. dear Ms or Miss or Mrs McJessie strikes me as archaic. For example, we receive an email enquiry about our services signed by "John Smith". My reply would begin "Dear John"- I would not even think about addressing him "Dear Mr Smith", unless I knew him to be 80-90 years old.

I truly detest those people who sign off "Alison Jones (Mrs)". Who gives a monkeys?

I had a call the other day from a letting agent who wanted to manage my flat. At the end of the call she asked "is McJessie your maiden name or your married name?". I said "I'm not married but don't see why that's relevant". She just moved on to the next question. I'm still racking my brains to work out why they could possibly need to know.

Finally, picking up on what Amanda said about how law firms sign off "Dear Sirs" letters in the name of the firm, it makes me laugh that we do literally handwrite the firm's name above where it is printed on the letter. Firms have their own internal rules about who reviews outgoing correspondence, but any qualified lawyer can sign once it's been approved internally.The first time after you qualify and do it, it's quite a thrill, you get to invent your own signature. Gosh, I really am sad....

Revolting is that why Mrs Hughes in Downton Abbey is called Mrs Hughes even though she's not married?

Ok, I will admit I have once done the sign-off with the bracketed title.

It was when a librarian took it on himself to patronize me about shelfmarks because I had used the short form (ie., 'CUL MS Add.' rather than 'Cambridge, University Library, MS Additional'), and gave me a short lecture about the proper form before accepting my request to look at the bloody thing.

He decided to address me as 'Miss' although I'd not used any title writing to him. I'm afraid I got back with a pissed-off 'Yours, LRD (Ms)'.

It did feel satisfying though.

You're probably kinda beyond that pettiness though! Congratulations on your upcoming promotion.

Oh and I forgot, I once got an email from a US lawyer who was addressing it to a group of us who had been on a conference call with him- four men and me. It began "Gentlepersons"... I never really worked out if he was taking the piss or not.

Oh, I love that.

Unfortunately, as long as society continues to hold the unspoken assumption that a women only has true worth when she is attached to a man, Ms is unlikely to take off. Married women will endless tell you how proud they are to be married to their DH, so they use Mrs. Well, I would put to them that what they are in fact proud of is being married at all (hence the endless threads in relationships where women have married absolute knobends).

Men are given the child's title of Master until they turn 18 (16?). Then they become Mr.

Women are given the child's title of Miss until they become legally attached to a man. At this point, they may be taken seriously as proper grown-up women are get the title of Mrs.

I remain baffled as to why so few women seem to have a problem with this.

Thanks LRD. I have actually used the brackets myself, but only to correct people who have written to me as Mr, because my RL name is gender- neutral. It's just so they don't get a surprise when they phone me! Whereas Alison in my example would not have that problem, so would only be using the brackets to advertise her irrelevant marital status. I'll also make an honourable exception for your sarcastic point

Thank you!