[ExI] Non-European PhDs In Germany Find Use Of 'Doktor' Verboten

[giovanni santost]

Well, I don't think completing the short degrees allows you to be call a Doctor. It is also important to mention that the old italian laurea fell slightly short of a PhD in terms of time and stardard required to obtain it.
  An the Italianian students will face what are master level classes from the first years of university, just focusing on his major.
  The term doctor, even if used in a jokingly way with people that not necessarily are doctors, it is actually much more respected in Italy than in America. To be a doctor is a real honor. As it is to be a engeneer, notary, attorney. We call professors even our high school teachers (that have to have a Laurea to teach) as a sign of respect. At least all this was true when I was in Italy almost 15 years ago.
  

Stefano Vaj <stefano.vaj at gmail.com> wrote:
  On Sun, Mar 16, 2008 at 2:37 PM, Amara Graps wrote:
> At the other end of the spectrum is Italy, where one can be called a
> 'Dr.' after a Laurea degree [2], there is even a shorter Laurea begun in
> Berlusconi's last period, so one could legally (in Italy) be called a
> Dr. after just a few years of university. And if you meet an Italian
> older than their later 50s with a PhD after their name, then they did
> not earn their PhD in Italy, since the PhD didn't exist (the PhD was
> offered in Italy starting in the middle 80s).

Yes. I am not sure about the new short courses, but all and every old
university degree were "doctorates" in Italian, in the very spirit of
the Spanish king who rather than abolishing nobility at a point in
time declared "todos caballeros", meaning that every citizen had been
automatically knighted. :-)

In fact, it is quite funny that when asking for an espresso in bar,
one gets often the reply "there it is, doctor" even though the waiter
hasn't the foggiest idea of what kind of education (primary school?)
his patron may have completed.

There is something however where Italy and the US are similar, namely
the fact that owing to the fact that American law schools, being
postgraduate, started in the XX century to call their degree JD (juris
doctor, or doctor in law), in both countries paradoxically a law
student become a Doctor first and a Master (more specifically, LLM.,
legum magister, master of law) later on, while this would not make any
sense in France, Germany or the UK, where the progression is
bacherlor/licensee, master, doctor in all fields.

Lastly, to be called doctor is a very umpleasant experience for an
Italian lawyer, since it reminds you of your period of statutory
training when you had not passed the bar yet, and thus people could
not call you "attorney"... :-)

All in all, I think I would gladly reserve the title of Dr. as a
courtesy prefix to MDs...

Stefano Vaj
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