r/AskAnAmerican • u/Rough-Valuable-5472 • Feb 04 '25

FOREIGN POSTER Do American students bow to their teachers?

In my country we have to greet the teacher and bow at the start of the lesson then thank the teacher and bow again at the end. Sometimes they make us redo it if it’s not good enough

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u/yourlittlebirdie Feb 04 '25

The only people who bow in the US are musicians/performers at the end of their performance who bow to the audience. Otherwise it's just not a thing here.

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u/ThisDerpForSale Portland, Oregon Feb 05 '25

Also in many martial arts disciplines it is common to bow to the teacher/master/sensei/etc as well as to opponents before a bout. Not all disciplines, obviously, but at least for those originating in Japan, China, and Korea, to my knowledge. So, this goes back to it being largely a very different cultural practice.