Amber+Johannes

Good grammar leads to violence at Starbucks?
**By debaron@illinois.edu **  Apparently an English professor was ejected from a Starbucks on Manhattan's Upper West Side for--she claims--not deploying Starbucks' mandatory corporate-speak. The story immediately lit up the internet, turning her into an instant celebrity. Just as Steven Slater, the JetBlue flight attendant who couldn't take it any more, became the heroic employee who finally bucked the system when he cursed out nasty passengers over the intercom and deployed the emergency slide to make his escape, Lynne Rosenthal was the customer who cared so much about good English that she finally stood up to the coffee giant and got run off the premises by New York's finest for her troubles. Well, at least that's what she says happened.

According to the // [|New York Post,] // Rosenthal, who teaches at Mercy College and has an English Ph. D. from Columbia, ordered a multigrain bagel at Starbucks but “became enraged when the barista at the franchise” asked, "Do you want butter or cheese?" She continued, "I refused to say 'without butter or cheese.' When you go to Burger King, you don't have to list the six things you //don't// want. Linguistically, it's stupid, and I'm a stickler for correct English." When she refused to answer, she claims that she was told, "You’re not going to get anything unless you say butter or cheese!" And then the cops came. Stickler for good English she may be, but management countered that the customer then made a scene and hurled obscenities at the barista, and according to the //Post,// police who were called to the scene insist that no one was ejected from the coffee shop. I too am a professor of English, and I too hate the corporate speak of “tall, grande, venti” that has invaded our discourse. But highly-paid consultants, not minimum-wage coffee slingers, created those terms (you won’t find a //grande// or a //venti// in Italian coffee bars). Consultants also told Starbuck’s to omit the apostrophe from its corporate name and to call its workers baristas, not coffee-jerks. My son was a barista (should that be //baristo//?) at Borders (also no apostrophe, though McDonald’s keeps the symbol, mostly) one summer, and many of my students work in restaurants, bars, and chain retail stores. The language that employees of the big chains use on the job is carefully scripted and choreographed by market researchers, who insist that employees speak certain words and phrases, while others are forbidden, because they think that's what moves "product." Scripts even tell workers how and where and when to move and what expression to paste on their faces. Employees who go off-script and use their own words risk demerits, or worse, if they’re caught by managers, grouchy customers, or the ubiquitous secret shoppers who ride the franchise circuit looking for infractions. I’m no fan of this corporate scripting. Calling customers “guests” and employees “associates” doesn’t mean I can treat Target like a friend’s living room or that the clerks who work there are anything but low-level employees who //associate// with one another, not with corporate vice presidents. I don’t think this kind of language-enforcement increases sales or makes our dining experience any more pleasant. Nonetheless, my sympathy is with the employee in this case, not the customer. Yes, "the customer is always right" is long gone from most businesses, but on the other hand, baristas, servers, and retail clerks, not to mention flight attendants, not only get told by management exactly what to do and say in every situation, but they also have to put up with a lot from the few overly-demanding customers who probably don’t even remember what the minimum wage is and often neglect a tip or, if it’s not a tipping business, a friendly word, if only the polite though scripted “Have a nice day.” Surely everyone overreacted during this incident at Starbucks, triggered by corporate-speech or just two people having a very bad day. But for me the story highlights the many constraints placed on our language by forces that may seem beyond our control. We are asked to believe that corporate success depends on uniformly-consistent products sold in cloned franchises by employees whose language is stamped from templates sent out by headquarters. But the uniformity is an illusion. Robots make cars that are all alike, but some of those cars can’t seem to stop very well, while others have no problem at all. Starbucks can make a bad cup of coffee from time to time, Target can sell a defective t-shirt, and fast-food burgers, whose manufacture and cooking is carefully controlled, can pass along //e. coli.// We want dependable products, yes, but when there’s too much uniformity we all crave the unique, the variant, the imperfection that makes life interesting. When it comes to language, people, employees and customers alike, can only stand so much sameness, so many templates. We definitely do not want fries with that, because, the way language works, we all have to go off-script from time to time, or go mad.

__ Summary __ In this article Baron emphasizes that depending on the situation, our language is being used as a persuasive tool. In this particular example, an english teacher went into a Starbucks and had issues in the establishment because of her disagreement with the improper use of English. Baron stresses that the employees in Starbucks are made to use certain word choice and style to create a certain setting and ambiance. He questions if this is correct because the "Starbucks style" is sneaking into our everyday life and taking over the use of proper English. Logos are shown in various ways, one being the use of Venti, Grande and Tall. Although those are Italian terms, he states that they are not used correctly which is misinterpreting. Baron also states that Lynne Rosenthal, the costumer that had an issue, was an english professor and, therefore, was very aware of how proper english should work. Pathos are brought up by how the employees are made to talk, look and act a certain way to maintain the style at Starbucks. The way they are manipulating how things are done, makes you feel like this is wrong and the costumer is almost taken advantage of in a way. Ethos is how secure you are with the writer of the article. In this case, Dennis Baron shows that he is an advocate of proper english and proper education of it. That makes you comfortable with his judgment because most people will agree, if they use it or not, that proper english is good and should be taught. __Analyze__ In my opinion, I agree with Baron's logic. Although I need work in the english department, I fell as if it is a very important thing to be used and taught correctly. There are many more ways that improper english is laced into everyday life. Look at the slang used for texting, Facebook or just an email; these are all becoming the normal thing to do and that makes us shy away from what is correct. Some of the things argued in the article seem a little far fetched because some things business do are simply for marketing, but that makes you think about how far they should be going with it. I liked how the article was written though. Baron summarizes, states the facts then concludes in his opinion what he feels is wrong with the situation. //** Amber - ﻿﻿Your summary is pretty solid although you need to remember in the future to always use language that indicates that the ideas in the summary are not yours but are the authors: he says, the author believes, he admits, etc...Your analysis is very brief and, I'm guessing, you didn't read/follow the instructions since there were many things there you were to discuss but didn't. Some good thinking though and a decent first college "paper." CHECK ~ Prof. Wendt **//  

There should be a stronger grammar education push in today’s schools, but in a way that adapts more to the way we speak. Grammar is very important in communication. Without grammar we would not be able to fully express our thoughts. Instead of teaching grammar in a way that is not useful anymore, we should teach it more like how we talk and interact. There is definitely a gap between how we speak and how we write, with correct grammar education we would lessen the gap and have a more consistent way of communication. We are so used to using shortcuts when texting or instant messaging that we have lost touch of the correct way to write. By molding grammar to the way we know would be very beneficial. If you were to write a paper without using any grammar it would be one long run on sentence. No thought would be understood correctly and it would be very hard to read. You see, grammar is needed to aid your thoughts but some grammar, as we know it, seems obsolete at times. We do not talk like we did in the 1800’s, so why should we write like that.