Published: CT magazine, May 2004
A lone banana rests on a white dining plate – silver knives and forks placed suggestively nearby. Nervous murmurs circulate around the dining table as potential recruits ponder how to approach the awkwardly shaped fruit. It sounds like an urban myth, but there are stories of some Australian employers – particularly in service-related industries – employing such tests to gauge the quality of their recruits’ manners. A plate of freshly podded peas is sometimes substituted for the banana.
British etiquette guides suggest the banana should first be addressed with the fork, and cut all the way along the inside of the curve with the knife from one end to other. The skin is then folded out with the knife and fork, while the banana is held still with the fork but not removed from the skin. Finally, the fruit is sliced into mouthful-sized slices, still held safely in the open skin. As for the peas, they should be squashed onto the back of a fork held in the left hand. Incorrect fork technique, such as stabbing, can see the green morsels bouncing across the table onto others’ plates.
Table manners of some form have been around for thousands of years – some researchers pointing to an etiquette scroll from Ancient Egypt in 2500 BC. By around the 11th century, people were still eating with fingers in Europe, while the use of the fork spread following the marriage of Catherine de Medicis of Italy (the fork was necessary for eating noodles) to Henry II of France. This precipitated new table customs as people ate from plates and had their own cups. Fingers were to be wiped on napkins and not tablecloths.
By the 1500s etiquette guides such as On Civility in Children by Desiderius Erasmus informed the upper classes on how to behave in the royal court. Erasmus informed people not to blow their noses or spit at the tables, and never to put chewed bones back on the plate. Others followed as the centuries rolled on, including Mrs Isabella Beeton’s Book of Household Management in 1861 and Emily Post’s Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics and at Home in 1922. Mrs Beeton offered quaint gems of advice under paragraphs which began “On the manner of passing evenings at home…”, “As the visitors are announced by the servant…” or “The guests being seated at the dinner table…”. In one section she warns of not seeking another serving of fish or soup as it might delay other company from starting their second courses.
The term “minding your P’s and Q’s” emerged in 1779, and while it is often employed by parents to remind children of appropriate behaviour at the table, its origins are widely contested. Some social historians trace its usage in advice to children not to confuse their handwritten lower-case letters (p and q), while others point to “pee and kew” – a 17th century expression for “prime quality”.
Stepping back from the table, sociologists like Norbert Elias, Margaret Visser and Claude Levi Strauss, have made table manners the subject of wider sociological enquiry. A common theme of their work is how social stratification is central to the development, evolution and ultimate social purpose of table manners.
Manners have long been important markers of social class and hierarchy. Not knowing how to eat properly has universally been a signal of outsider status. An anonymous Victorian manners guide from the late 1800s noted that etiquette was “the barrier which society draws around itself, a shield against the intrusion of the impertinent, the improper, and the vulgar.” As Visser writes, such manners were considered innate and evolved into such mystifying forms (eg elaborate rules for the use of multiple forks, spoons, knives and glasses developed by the English elite) so as to prevent outsiders from acquiring the social skills necessary to be accepted. “It could not be that for the steadily decreasing price of a book on manners you could make your way into the best circles,” she wrote.
While manners were also important social markers in American society, they did not serve to limit social mobility to the same degree as in England. Consequently, etiquette handbooks flourished in America, providing advice on how to become refined. As Emily Post wrote, “best society is not a fellowship of the wealthy, nor does it seek to exclude those who are not exalted by birth”.
The arbitrary nature of manners has also interested academics. Elias saw manners as simply highly ritualised and learnt behaviours, but not necessarily rational. In The Civilising Process (1936), he asks us to consider in depth the real use of the fork and why it is considered more ‘civilised’ than the use of fingers. The fork to Elias is merely the emodiment of a specific standard of emotions which have been learnt. In the Middle Ages (and even in some contemporary cultures), he argues, the handling of food was not considered distasteful and our use of cutlery cannot be rationalised in terms of hygiene. With people eating less from shared dishes, it should pose little concern.
The arbitrary nature of manners is illustrated by Queen Victoria’s diplomatic evening in London over a century ago. The guest of honour, an African chef, was unaware of the purpose of a finger bowl. Towards the end of the evening, he drank its contents to the bottom. There was silence among the British upper classes at the table, until the Queen took the bowl and drank from it as well – another 500 British ladies following soon after. In a flash the Queen had deemed acceptable the once highly unacceptable – at least temporarily.
In contemporary times, a common complaint is a purported decline in manners among the younger generation. The late Craig Claiborne, Food Editor with the New York Times for 30 years, wrote that we live in a society where too many people believe good manners (perhaps like good spelling) is not necessary for survival. As Claiborne wrote in his 1992 Elements of Etiquette: A Guide to Table Manners in An Imperfect World, we may live in times when nearly everything goes, but there are still waiters, hosts and hostesses who will frown if we break too many of the rules of etiquette at the dinner table.
Despite an Australian obsession with all things food in recent years, there is interestingly limited public discussion of the role of manners. People raised under a strict regime of manners (such as that imposed by my parents – who suggested I would never dine at Government House) could well be shocked by how today’s youth handle themselves at the table. Lizzie Wagner of Lizzie Wagner’s Academy (a local finishing and modeling academy) agrees there has been an undeniable decline in table manners in Australia over recent decades, largely reflecting social factors. “Internet, TV, and video games have had a big impact. It means that the whole practice of getting home, talking about school, setting the table, and dinner conversation has gone. Hence, table manners are not being reinforced or corrected. Some parents don’t finish work until 7-8pm and children have gone to bed.” she said.
Some of Wagner’s contemporary no-nos include use of mobile phones at dinner, guests not waiting for others to be seated before commencing a meal, and people who unnecessarily fuss over splitting the bill (eg I had the cafe latte, who had the macchiato?). Fortunately for a range of Canberrans – diplomats, models, business people and politicians – Wagner is available to polish etiquette and prepare us for important social occasions. Social events involving people of other cultures often prompt a cry for help.
Indeed, multiculturalism and globalised sources of information pose new challenges in identifying an agreed set of manners for modern Australia. While some of us have a general appreciation of the correct placement of the knife and fork, imagine the mistakes we are making with chopsticks in the company of Chinese Australians (eg pointing them upwards or at people is bad luck) or the fork/spoon combination provided at Thai restaurants (ie the fork should not be put in the mouth). Children mixing with school mates of different ethnic backgrounds might have reason to be confused.
Even within Western culture, there are traps. Imagine an Australian, German and American eating at a Canberra restaurant. The waiter understands that the Australian is still eating by the fork and knife placed in an upside-down V shape, but is baffled by the German guest’s placement of knife and fork in a “five minutes to five o’clock” pattern (an indication of completion of the meal in German culture). And while the Australian is refined in holding the fork and knife in left/right hand combination, what do we make of the Amercian zig-zagging (cutting food with knife and fork, then placing the knife down on the top of the plate with the blade facing in, and placing the fork in left hand with tines facing up)? Clearly other cultures offer sharper examples of differences in what is considered appropriate. Most of us are aware that the Japanese, for example, slurp soup loudly as a measure of the quality of the food and skill of the Chef.
Back to the question of changing table manners, some sociologists contest whether it is even appropriate to talk about ‘decline’ or ‘improvement’ . If several generations of Australian children grow up without reinforcement of manners once considered important, their behaviour at the table may not prompt the instinctual feelings of embarrassment or disgust they once did. Visser, in The Rituals of Dinner (1990), avoids suggesting we are a ruder species now, suggesting that we obey a regime of “informality” which rules us as strongly as formal protocol ever did. In contrast with the role manners played in Victorian England, informal manners reduce social distance and reinforce equality between people. “Polite behaviour now demands constant assurances that one is in no way superior to other people – even if, and especially if, one is quite obviously in a position of power,” she wrote. This seems especially relevant to the egalitarian Australian context, where “feeling at home” is something we strive to create in social situations, inviting guests to “help themselves” from the fridge or the bottle at the table.
While this trend towards informality will push the boundaries of appropriate behaviour, there are those of us still want to believe in the existence of some absolute rules. History, too, might be on our side. While the more archaic aspects of social etiquette have been discarded with servants and maids, there is a suprising stability in core manners from the early etiquette guides to contemporary accounts. These include maxims such as not putting elbows on the table, not talking when the mouth is full, never indicating that you notice anything unpleasant in the food, not breaking bread into soup, and eating soup with the side of the spoon.
If you are now dazed and confused by the thought of handling yourself at your next work outing, Lizzie Wagner offers some simple advice. “Etiquette is simply all about respect and consideration of others. So, if we are eating in a particular culture where they eat with chopsticks or fingers up to the knuckles – that is what we should do.” So the next time you order a bowl of ramen noodles in the company of some Japanese friends or business people, you better mind your P’s and Q’s – that is eat them as loudly as possible, slurping all the way.