News0 min ago
Being mentored
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How do you refer to a person being mentored? In other words, a person being mentored is a . . .?
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Chambers Dictionary offers 'mentee',- as Golem says above. However, the tendency nowadays is just to add double-'e' to the end of the basic word which would give 'mentoree'. The Oxford English Dictionary - generally the 'bible' in such matters - mentions neither.
'Mentor' itself comes from the name of a character in Homer's Odyssey, so the 'or' part is not just an add-on such as we find in 'conqueror' etc. I suspect that's why the OED avoids it!
'Mentor' itself comes from the name of a character in Homer's Odyssey, so the 'or' part is not just an add-on such as we find in 'conqueror' etc. I suspect that's why the OED avoids it!
Why not use 'prot�g�(e)'? Yes, it's French, but - unlike 'mentee' - it has been around in English for centuries.
Chambers defines that as "someone under the protection or patronage of another person". To that, the OED adds, after 'person', the words "of superior position or influence". That seems a perfect definition of 'someone being mentored' and avoids the ugliness of the American management-speak 'mentee'.
Chambers defines that as "someone under the protection or patronage of another person". To that, the OED adds, after 'person', the words "of superior position or influence". That seems a perfect definition of 'someone being mentored' and avoids the ugliness of the American management-speak 'mentee'.
A nice point, Dr J, but perhaps over-classical!
I should perhaps have mentioned in my opening response above, Uzoma, that Chambers comments re 'mentee' that it is (quote) "non-standard". It seems, therefore, that even its editors were not wholly convinced that it was a fully-accepted word in British usage in 2003.
It first appeared in America in the mid-1960s, whilst the latest print edition of The Oxford English Dictionary came out in the late 1980s. Clearly - given that that dictionary does not give it house-room - it had failed to catch on here in a quarter of a century. I myself have not heard it used to this day in Britain either, although it now is listed in the online OED.
As far as I am concerned, we all have as much right to use 'mentee' to refer to someone sent to a mental institution or even someone mentioned!
I should perhaps have mentioned in my opening response above, Uzoma, that Chambers comments re 'mentee' that it is (quote) "non-standard". It seems, therefore, that even its editors were not wholly convinced that it was a fully-accepted word in British usage in 2003.
It first appeared in America in the mid-1960s, whilst the latest print edition of The Oxford English Dictionary came out in the late 1980s. Clearly - given that that dictionary does not give it house-room - it had failed to catch on here in a quarter of a century. I myself have not heard it used to this day in Britain either, although it now is listed in the online OED.
As far as I am concerned, we all have as much right to use 'mentee' to refer to someone sent to a mental institution or even someone mentioned!
There is, of course, an element of pupillage in being mentored, but I don't see the words as being really synonymous. Mentoring, for me, implies a greater element of 'care' and overall 'involvement' than most 'pupils' get from those involved in simply 'teaching' them.
Having said that, I do think 'pupil' is vastly preferable to 'mentee'!
Having said that, I do think 'pupil' is vastly preferable to 'mentee'!
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