礼节美语 053 The Etiquette of Replying to E-mail

陈豪在北京的ABC美国公司工作。他在走廊上遇见了美国同事Amy。

(Office ambience)

C：Amy, 我找了你一整天。

A：What is it?

C：我有个关于电子邮件的问题。每次我回信，都是点击Relpy, 保留原来的内容，然后把我的答复加上去。

A：That's not unusual.

C：今天有个同事告诉我，说我不应该保留电子邮件里原来的内容。可我不明白，如果删掉原来的内容，她怎么能知道我在说些什么呢？

A：She no doubt would have preferred that you take the time to paraphrase her message in the body of your reply.

C：什么叫paraphrase啊？

A：To paraphrase means to rephrase or restate what someone else has said or written.

C：你能举个例子吗？比如说，她发电子邮件给我，问我星期三上午11点有没有时间开会讨论新产品。

A：In that case, instead of hitting "Reply" and responding, "Yes, I am available;" you should write, "Yes, I am available to meet on Wednesday at 11 AM to discuss the new product."

C：就是把话说完整。

A：Yes. By restating her message, you have confirmed that you will be at the meeting on the right day at the right time.

C：照你的话说，出于礼貌，我在回复电子邮件的时候，都应该把原来信里的核心内容重复一遍了？

A：Yes, In that case you can delete the original at the bottom of your response. I have to go now. Do you want to continue this discussion at another time?

C：好。下次再聊吧。

******

MC：第二天早上陈豪和Amy一起喝咖啡。

C：昨天那个同事还说，如果电子邮件的内容变了，用回复的功能，就不能保留原来的题目。是这样吗？

A：She is definitely right. It is very confusing to receive a message from someone who changed the subject in the e-mail and not in the subject line.

C：你能不能解释一下。

A：If I send you a message about a project we are working on and I use "Project A Summary" as the subject line, you have a clear expectation about what information is contained in the e-mail.

C：我用回复的功能，告诉你我收到了报告。

A：Right. Now let's say that I need to send you a message about our next team meeting. If I use your reply to me - which you recall has the subject line, "Project Summary"; you expect to read more about the project.

C：对啊，我会以为里面是关于这个项目更详细的内容，但打开却发现是截然不同的内容。好，我以后一定记住改掉电子邮件的题目。

A：Better yet, if you are sending e-mail on a new topic, start a new message with a new subject header.