Comment by colanderman
5 years ago
I suspect in "American", "how are you" is often a request for actionable information. Your Russian friend took the question as an absolute, was confused why the doctor was asking a question with an obvious answer, and proceeded to give a reply which communicated no new information to the doctor. The doctor meanwhile was expecting an answer relative to the information he had, and hence took the negative reply as a sign of a sudden ill turn of health.
Similar when interacting with customer service. They don't want to know how you are, they want to know why you're talking with them, how they need to approach you. If you're calling about your cable bill and tell them you're not doing well because your aunt died, well, that's not actionable by them. They want to know how you're doing in the context of your cable bill. Even if your answer is "good, but I have a billing issue", it usefully sets the tone for the conversation in a way that "bad, Aunt Gerda passed away" does not.
> “good, but I have a billing issue"
I think this gets exactly to it, but I don’t agree with the rest of your comment.
In both the provided examples, the fact that there's a request for actionable information is already implicitly understood based on the situation. When a doctor comes into your room, you already know they're checking on your condition. The "How are you?" is just general greeting (to which, in casual situations, the proper response is "Fine, and you?").
And this is the crux of the misunderstanding. The Russian takes it as a request for information when it isn't.
*Edit*: A YouTube video pulled from another comment in this thread that explains what I was trying to say much better: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=eGnH0KAXhCw&feature=youtu.be
I think the doctor was asking, relative to the situation that you're in, how are you? In other words, given that you're in this shitty situation, do you feel worse or better than you expect?
If he's still in a lot of pain then the doctor would expect the patient to say that. "The nurses are treating me well, the food is fine, but I'm still in a lot of pain. Is there anything you can do about that?"
The doctor was asking a question relative to the situation and the Russian interpreted as an absolute question.
It is a request for new information, in the specific case of a doctor seeing an admitted patient. Which makes his nervous response more inappropriate.
A common Russian greeting "Как дела?" is exactly as same as "How are you?" (it literally means "How are (your) affairs?") and people also do not take it literally. Sometimes people reply with some pun playing off even more literal meaning of the question, e.g. "дела" could also mean "criminal cases" so one might respond "Дела у прокурора, а у нас - делишки" (something like "The DA has cases but we just hustle"). I suspect the hero of the GP post might be making a similar joke in English.
>I suspect in "American", "how are you" is often a request for actionable information. Your Russian friend took the question as an absolute, was confused why the doctor was asking a question with an obvious answer, and proceeded to give a reply which communicated no new information to the doctor.
This situation is a very common standup joke here in Russia since like the 70s or 80s when some of our movie or theater stars were in the US (or some other 'capitalistic' country) and were constantly asked 'how are you' in a hallway.