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Starbucks Lingo Makes English Professor Snap

by Robert Quigley | 11:47 am, August 16th, 2010

An English professor named Lynne Rosenthal claims to have been forcibly ejected from a Starbucks yesterday when a barista refused to place her order because she refused to use Starbucks’ ordering protocol. The usual populist complaint against Starbucks concerns the chain’s deliberately pretentious sizing: Rather than ‘small,’ ‘medium,’ and ‘large,’ they’ve got ‘tall,’ ‘grande,’ and ‘venti.’ (And, God willing one day, the 32-ounce Trenta, which is currently being tested in some markets.)

But while the New York Post says that Rosenthal “refus[es] to employ the chain’s stilted lexicon — balking at ordering a ‘tall’ or a ‘venti’ from the menu or specifying ‘no whip,’” and “insists on making a pest of herself by ordering a “small” or “large” cup of joe,” her complaint this time was a little more arcane, and concerned bagels:

NY Post:

Rosenthal, who is in her early 60s, asked for a toasted multigrain bagel — and became enraged when the barista at the franchise, on Columbus Avenue at 86th Street, followed up by inquiring, “Do you want butter or cheese?”

“I just wanted a multigrain bagel,” Rosenthal told The Post. “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.”

So after asking the obvious question ‘why was she ordering a bagel at Starbucks’: What was her linguistic beef, exactly? There’s nothing grammatically wrong with the question “Do you want butter or cheese?” as asked about a multigrain bagel; however, we’re guessing that Rosenthal’s problem was one of semantics, that field of linguistics that explores the relationship between words and the things they stand for.

That is: If you order a “multigrain bagel,” you’re presumably asking for just a multigrain bagel. And if you wanted it with cream cheese or butter, you’d say, “I’d like a multigrain bagel with cream cheese” or “I’d like a multigrain bagel with butter”; the toppings of the bagel are expressed as distinct from the bagel itself. However, if you ask for a bagel and you are forced to respond to the question, “do you want butter or cheese?” your questioner presumes that the bagel-unit encompasses the bagel and its topping. Should the word “bagel” be sufficient to convey the meaning “a bagel with nothing on it,” or should you have to say “a bagel with nothing on it,” which presumes that a “bagel,” by default, has something on it?

Is this splitting hairs? Was Rosenthal justified in her protest, or did she go too far? Possibly relevant: Another Starbucks employee claimed that she called the barista an “asshole.”

(NY Post via Pat’s Papers. title image via Ermelo Villareal Jr.)

  • siohwito

    Damned if you do, damned if you don’t when someone has a chip on their shoulder like this Lynne Rosenthal. I understand the gripe about speaking or understanding the ‘Starbukian’ which at one time baristas were encouraged to get customers to “learn”, but the barista in this situation is only guilty of providing customer service. What the barista is saying by offering butter or cheese with the multigrain bagel is “Hey, I don’t want to eff up your order and people usually have butter or cheese with their bagel, so I will overtly offer you some in a truncated syntax.” There is nothing wrong with clarifying the order, so Rosenthal be damned for refusing to say “No, thanks.”

  • http://Yahoo!Pulse Herrmungus

    All I can say is she brings it on herself by her stubborn refusal to go somewhere else where they do not practice the things that enrage her so. My question is: Is this road rage related? Is she exhibiting this behavior after her morning commute or before? Does she drive to work on busy streets, take a crowded subway, or perhaps carpool? Any of the above could tax you to the limit and all it will take at this point is someone aking “Do you want butter or cream cheese with that?” to completely blow your mind. My advice? Change stores, change jobs, get a new attitude. The poor barrista is just doing his.her job the way their employer requires it to be done. and Barristas… mellow out folks, not everyone is going to play the Starbucks Word Game and call it what it is named by the chain, some people resist change, cut them some slack, they are after all the ones who make sure there is money to pay your salary. la8tr all

  • http://www.bradleyfarless.com/ BradleyF81

    I think the culture that Starbucks is trying to promote is absolutely retarded. It’s always good for a laugh. That being said, I typically get my coffee elsewhere, not only to not have to order a ‘venti’ rather than a large, but because they overprice their drinks as well. If I do have to go to a Starbucks, I just deal with it. As long as I remember that I’m not falling for their propaganda BS, then I’ll be ok.


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