Title: Acceptance in the Workplace
General Information About this Item:
- Rite of Passage, workplace folklore
- Language: English
- Country of Origin: United States
- Informant: Informant #2
- Date Collected: 2/20/18
Informant Data:
- FO+M worker, started working for the college relatively recently (within the last ten years). Not originally from the Upper Valley.
Contextual Data:
- Facilities, Operations, and Management is a broad department containing numerous divisions, offices, and shops. It hires people from a variety of backgrounds, ranging from young people straight out of school to experienced workers. There are no specific initiation rites for new employees, but the informant observes one clear trend with new hires.This practice was both observed by the informant and communicated to her by more experienced employees when she started her job.
- According to current employees, FO+M has changed dramatically in the last 10-20 years. Accordingly, there is a widely acknowledged difference between “New Dartmouth” and “Old Dartmouth.”
Item:
- Employees are typically vary polite and diplomatic with new employees. Only after some time has passed will employees be willing to joke around with or open up about their lives outside of work to more recent hires.
Transcript:
- “The only thing I can think of, at least for this area, is when you first get here people are vary diplomatic… when I was new everyone was very diplomatic and very by the book. And the longer you’re here you know you’ve arrived when someone will like tell a joke around you”
Collector’s Comments:
This item seems closely connected to the notion of “Old Dartmouth v. New Dartmouth,” an idea I heard about from multiple informants.
Collector’s Name: Jacob Cruger
Tags/Keywords:
- Rite of passage, rites of passage
- FO+M