Why do Americans speak about family by their names, like we know them?

Because that's the etiquette norm.

The norm reflects the attitude that someone's name represents them as a person rather than some role of theirs. It is therefore seen as more respectful to use this form of reference wherever possible rather than "reducing them to their role".

Pretty much all norms like this are culturally determined with just-as-strong-arguments being available for doing it some other way, but if you want to play basketball, you have to learn the rules of basketball, and if you want to exist within some particular society...

Within this norm, one introduces the name ("my girlfriend Emma") and expects the other to either remember Emma is their girlfriend or to be able to fake remembering that Emma is their girlfriend (the latter is a major part of the norm).

It's also the case that not using the person's name signals keeping your interlocutor at a distance, equivalent to "I wouldn't want to introduce you to this person", which in informal workplaces is seen as rude. For you as the person who does not have a direct relationship with Emma, it's not inherently disrespectful to the girlfriend to fall back into the anonymous mode of reference ("you said your girlfriend was on a vacation?") but showing that you remember the name is a social signal that you care about your coworker.

There are much more complicated regional/socioeconomic/cultural variants and subtle shades on all this, of course. Among my father's family, given names aren't common in reference, but all references to shared relatives -- even among adults -- are given not relative to the speaker, but to the audience ("your cousin" instead of "my sister", "your father" instead of "my uncle"). This is much harder to do than you'd think if you didn't grow up doing it!

The first few personal/friendly conversations they likely said "my girlfriend, Emma," but then it'll be assumed you remember that Emma is the girlfriend.

I think it's about building friendship and closeness - they are sharing their life as they see it through their own eyes and dropping the impersonal role-only description of important people in their life. It is also reflective of a more-casual culture than many (especially at the office). Many Americans like to actually be friends with their coworkers.

It's similar to narration in a written story - important characters are introduced by their role and name, but role gets dropped once they're familiar.

If I am just getting to know you, I will use references like "my husband" or "my husband, Tom". After I have know you a while, I will probably become less formal and just use the name "Tom" on the assumption that with history and context you will know who I mean.

If these people are colleagues, is the the first time you are speaking to them or do you have an existing relationship?

We were just talking about this yesterday in my family... I think you should take it as a sign of intimacy, that is to say that there is a familiarity and and comfort such that they are willing to share things about their personal life as though you know them on that level. Either that or they just aren't self aware enough to know that you don't have any idea who Emma and Jake are. The better approach is to say something like "I had to watch my son Jake for two hours" so that the listener has context, but of course that assumes the speaker is aware enough in their communication patterns to want to give the other party helpful cues.

This reminds me of something my son Tom said. ;-P

I, an American, only drop the name if it's going to be useful later, e.g. you're going to meet my girlfriend or son soon, or I'm about to launch into a tale in which it would be inconvenient to refer to people only by title. Or if we're on a level of friendship that socially dictates you can or should be made aware of my family members' names.

I can say (for me) it gets "weird" if you just keep referring to "my wife" for too long in a friendship. Sooner or later you'd have to give a name, or it sounds like you're trying to keep things impersonal--mixed signals. "The guy seems like he's my pal, but he keeps referring to his wife as 'my wife' and won't give a name." It feels like I'm not even worthy of knowing the names of people in your family. And maybe I'm not--maybe I'm just your coworker and that's where things end. But if we're hanging out, going on hikes and stuff, it'd be time to put a name to that title.

So though I don't do this (that I'm aware of?), I can imagine Americans putting the name out there early to encourage closeness, that you might think, "Oh, this person really wants to be friends since they already told me their son's name."

I know Americans have the related reputation of being hyper talkative and friendly with people they've never met and are unlikely to meet again. And that's just part of the culture, especially in smaller towns. We consider it to be welcoming, while foreigners might consider it intrusive and rude. I always tone it way down when I'm talking to non-Americans. But if I'm buying groceries, at the very minimum, the clerk and I are going to have a conversation about how our days are going, and probably what our later plans are.

And it would be a little weird to drop a family member's name at that point. But it would actually be acceptable to do so.

I can't say that I see this as a common occurrence in my 20 years in US workforce outside of situations where there is familiarity with the parties involved.

Come to think of it, I know the marital status and if most of my coworkers have children, but I do not know the name of a single one of those family members. They are always referred to as son/daughter/kid/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/husband.

I know the names of the spouses and kids of coworkers from my previous company, but I have met them in person.

I generally never just use someone’s name unless I’m absolutely positive the other person knows who I’m talking about. I would just say, “my friend Jack” to a new person.

I’ve always found it odd when people use names but I don’t know that person or their relation to the one I’m talking with.

I’m from the US, so I really think it just depends on the person.

It's a much more personal/intimate way of interacting with someone. I know the names of many/most of my co-worker's SOs and kids and vice versa.

Not universal at all. All of my colleagues, as well as myself, refer to our wives as "my wife" and kids as "my son" or "my daughter". Even though I've worked with these folks a few years, I don't often mention my family members by name.

I don't think there has to be a reason, any more than there's a reason why Americans say "y'all" or "howdy" or "dude". People just pick up habits from each other.

Beware of looking for deep reasons for shallow phenomena.

Hmm, that's interesting. I'm not from US and you might be onto something. I don't know names of SOs of my team members, besides one. As per children, I don't know either.

I'm not an American and would use "my friend", "the friend of a flatmate of a friend", etc instead of names.

However, this ends up being a bit cumbersome, it would probably more efficient to introduce names a first time and just use names after, and let people ask "Who's Emma already?" if they don't remember or if you forgot to introduce the name. This feels off to me however, so I don't do this unless it becomes to cumbersome in a conversations.

You probably missed the original name drop, or they forgot they haven't dropped it. If you find yourself in that situation, it is not impolite to ask for clarification as to "who is X in all this"?

The customary response is to furnish the information that someone is related to you in Y way.

The polite thing is then to let them go on with the exchange.

It is not polite to try to drill out the entire family tree. (Unless there has been such a multitude of name drops, in which case it is okay to ask for clarification for each in turn, and an optional "who are they to each other may be warranted just to keep the relationships straight).

In the U.S. this had been totally normal. As it is generally considered that one one is speaking to is the holder of a shared of a shared context. Back in the day, there wasn't a massive infrastructure or mass reproducible mechanism for background verification, and it was up to you to determine and measure whether or not someone else was eorth sharing such details with. It was also polite to decline to furnish such information as irrelevant.

I've noticed with social media, people get in the habit of assuming everyone already does.

Thus killing one of the opportunities for enjoyable small talk. The ritual of the unrolling of family connections. This was aldo a form of shibboleth before facebook and the like, as anyone who knew you through a relative would generally get a higher degree of trust.

This is completely bunk now, or at least far less useful than it once was in the presence of Docial media and OSIntel.

From the US, and don't find this that common. I also find it incredibly annoying, but that's probably because the last one had a spouse with my same first name.

If I had to even try to pin it down, I'd maybe say it could be a younger person or west coast thing?

On the east coast, I've never worked with anyone who called their relatives by name. I haven't worked with many younger people on the east coast though, to be fair.

There are a huge number of cultural differences in the US to other places, with all sorts of different reason behind them (seriously it is like being on a different planet), and the reasons can be hard to pin down.

However, a lot of them, and I think this one included, can be put down to the ethos with which Americans interact with each other. In other Western countries (perhaps with the exception of Mediterranean Europe) it is considered polite to not expect things of your interlocutor unless you know them well, and even then, not so much. In the US it seems to me that it is much more acceptable to be somewhat demanding of strangers, for their time and attention, and it is expected that you will do the same back. When an American uses first names for their family, they are, if we were to exaggerate greatly, be saying "How stranger! This is my family, I demand you WILL know them, and I will follow your demands that I know yours, as is custom in these parts, now let us break bread."... I know it's ridiculous, but I find looking at things this way helped me a lot.

Canadian here, and I do this too.

Part of the reason is that it's like passively introducing the person, or reminding the listener of the person's name, without the listener needing to ask.

I have a horrible time remembering names, esp. co-workers' spouce/kids names. I appreciate it when they do this.

EDIT: Western Canadian, and Shauna does this too :)

“Why bother having any non-transactional conversation at all?”

lol this seems so wildly tone deaf. Good luck OP!

English language evolved as an impure, populist language with lots of foreign words, phrases and popular expressions. It could be argued that American English is taking that further, using any convenient phrase or form that is trendy; simplification and over-simplification is common. It might be said that American English repeatedly evolves towards commercial uses and shopping situations, specifically to replace elite language, ways of speaking and specialized words. Words from popular songs and phrases from advertising often get formal status over time.

This informal and intimate language construct might be an example of trendy oversimplification in American English.

I think it can be confusing even for Americans. My wife goes nuts when my mom refers to our kids in the third person. Ex:”This child is so clever”, said in the presence of said kid, wife and me. Trying to pick apart American speech norms, education level, parents cultural differences can be very frustrating when trying to figure out what is really happening, that the individuals can’t explain. My mom grew is 1st generation American from El Salvadoran and Greek parents. My wife is first generation American from Taiwanese parents. Summary: it’s complicated, even for Americans.

Sorry to be blunt, but I guess it’s in their culture to do so. It’s not “like you know them”, they just like to talk about people by their name instead of repeating my son this my son that.

It’s just different.

People use names when they think you've been introduced or they've at least mentioned the mapping before. Sometimes you slip up and forget in both ways.

In a group setting, I think people skew towards using the name if anyone in the group has been introduced. So if you're on some Zoom call and you're the new person in the room, I wouldn't expect people to switch from names to pronouns for your benefit. Everyone else knows the mapping already and you just have to pick up these names from context.

I am American (or at least was, I emigrated away) and will use the names of my family members to people who have asked about them and I have mentioned the names before. Using them without ever introducing them sounds very strange (nothing to do with casualness or whatever, you would just have no way to know what I am talking about.)

I suspect they think they have already mentioned them before, but forgot they didn’t? Or are you saying it is weird even if you know their names to refer to them by name?

A worse variant of this is when people use a name that their listeners wouldn't, e.g. using "Mom"/"Dad" with a non-sibling instead of "my mom"/"my dad", as in: "Dad is in the hospital." Seems weirdly self-centered to use a name that your listener wouldn't use when addressing the same person.

Well obviously as an American* I can speak for all Americans. Obviously.

Anywho, the reasoning is simple. If you know who my tribe members are without me ever having to bother to tell you, you must be cool. Otherwise you are just not part of my tribe, an Other.

But don't worry, we invented social media (just like we invented everything else, from radio to the Renaissance) so if you want to be part of my tribe, you can do your research, depending on how private and exclusive I feel like being today.

*Don't believe those Canadians or anyone else who lives on either of the two continents in the new world, only US-ians get to claim American as a word!!

PS: this is all a rather bombastic attempt at a joke (potentially satire?). The real reason (I'd guess) is we aren't all uniformly well trained in polite etiquette like not being so self absorbed that we assume everyone knows who our family are.

I notice this a lot with my European, African, and Latin American colleagues as well.

I’m not sure it’s a general trend, really gotta be weary of the “couple people in my life do x” -> “why do {general class} do x?” movement

I know people that take this to ridiculous levels. It’s one thing for me to know your significant other’s name, but a couple people I work with do this for everyone in their life with no real introduction.

I'm American, and I don't really see people doing this except if they already know the person. I sure don't

I wonder if it's regional (I've only lived in the Northeast and Deep South)

It’s a way of introducing them to you at a more intimate level. However depending on the situations it’s also common to keep saying girlfriend as a shield so that she remains pseudonymous.

I wonder whether this is evidence of the overall casualness of US-ians that people keep talking about. Just assuming that they discussed who’s who in past conversations?

I wouldn't say it's as common as this thread makes it seem. It's a personal preference thing. I don't think there is always a reason behind it.

I have seen this from people all over the world. It's not "like we know them", it's just a quip to make the conversation more intimate.

Isn't it just normal worldwide practice? Imagine Emma if you are greeting her with "hello girlfriend, how are you?"

What part of America? I don't know anyone who does that, unless they are in a group of people they know.

we’re inviting you into a more personal context of our lives.