Except in Utah.
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I remember when the Ms Miss Mrs thing was a big deal, some married and single women would flip at the honorific Ms…"I’m a Mrs., not a Ms., i worked for years to earn this husband and I’m proud of it…while others thought anything but Ms. was disgustingly sexist.
Lately though I feel that we are settling in to the following conventions
Mrs – adult married female, used in conjunction with husband’s first name, usually socially
Mr and Mrs Bob Jones
Mrs Bob Jones
Ms. adult female, single or married, often used in business
Ms. Anne Jones
Miss
Female child or young teenager
Miss Anne Jones
Master
Male child or young teenager
Master Bob Jones
These last two I only see in formal situations, otherwise it’s Bob or Anne.
Note this is for honorifics, saying “Excuse me, Miss” is different
I am now wondering whether we should pronounce ‘Mr’ as ‘murr’. Mizz and Murr… 
As Cecil said, that sounds like you tied your letter to a rock and threw it in over the wall.
Now, this one annoys me. Not the use of ‘Mrs’ in this situation, but the use of the husband’s personal name when addressing the wife. Shouldn’t it be ‘Mrs Jane Jones’? Or are we simply saying that this woman is ‘the husband of Bob Jones’, not ‘Jane Jones, who happens to be married to Bob’? Wouldn’t the shared last name be sufficient to indicate the marriage? [edit] I just reread Hilarity’s post, and I’m kind of split on the idea. I agree that ‘Mrs Bob Jones’ would work; I just don’t think it should be the default.
I don’t think that Sound Mind is saying that it’s the default, but rather giving a list of usages and their meanings.
While I do have to say that I don’t appreciate your (Hopefully uninentional) snide tone with regards to a problem of ignorance rather than intelligence, I have to remind you that in my entire life I’ve never been in a situation where the distinction was important, nor in a situation where I’ve been called out on it, nor has this particular distinction ever been taught to me in school… elementary education is unfortunately very lacking in a lot of things, or at least it was when I was there.
So the tone of your post as “Well why shouldn’t it have just occurred to you?” seems lacking in understanding of the fact that for my entire life this has been a complete non-issue (most females in my life are addressed by either first name, Mrs., Professor, or Dr.) and thus has not been something I’ve had any time or care to think about. That being said, the only reason I posted this thread was for clarification on the issue specifically because I was ignorant of the difference and this was only made apparent to me because someone called me out on it.
Sorry for the double-post but I had to read more carefully to catch this. All of your teachers presumably had their names spelled “Mrs. teachersuchandsuch”, but did you or any other children call her “Mistress”? I should certainly hope not - children shouldn’t be getting lessons in BDSM (from their grade school teachers or anyone else, for that matter). Mrs. now sounds like “misses”. You’re right, etymologically, that Mrs. is a contraction of Mistress, but the word Mrs. is now pronounced Misses. My spelling it as “misses” rather than “missus” or “missis” is a reflection of the way the word is pronounced in a Connecticut dialect.
From Wikipedia:
And I find it bizarre to the point of impossibility that you really live in a world where you’ve never met anyone titled Ms. However, I don’t actually think you’re lying, so I’m just left utterly bewildered.
Imagine if I’d said that I’d never heard of apples despite growing up in a country where there are plenty. Wouldn’t that seem weird to you? This gap in your knowledge is approaching that level of weirdness. Even though it’s not your fault, it’s still really, really, really odd.
A small correction - the vast majority of younger women I know would never use the husband’s given name, but would use the “Mrs. Mary Jones” construction instead. I’ve personally only ever seen much older women use your version (as in, seniors). YMMV, of course.
There’s nothing wrong, of course, etiquette-wise, with the Mrs. Bob Jones construction. But it feels to me like a hold over from the “woman as appendage to man” days. I suspect that I’m not alone with that.
Actually, my teachers were an even split between Mrs, Miss and Ms.
In practice, we called them Miss/Mrs/Ms Whatever when using their full name, but always miss when addressing them without their name, which we did more often. ‘Miss, what does this mean? Miss, miss, he hit me!’
You claimed that Mrs was short for Misses, which I corrected. The abbreviation is pronounced misses (would you pronounce missus and missis differently to misses, then?), but it’s still short for mistress.
The other reason I corrected you was because it was funny. 
I am a 28 year old married woman who goes by Ms and kept her maiden name. I absolutely hate the “Mrs John Smith” title and made sure at my wedding that it was not used. I am more than a appendage of my husband, and should not be referred to as such. I wouldn’t except him to want to be called Mr Jane Jones and I expect the same courtesy.
Basically my marrital status is of no consiquence to anyone but my husband, so what does it matter if a stranger knows or not?
There’s always one.
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You’re putting forth the Argument from Ignorance, from what I’m reading you’re trying to say “I can’t imagine anybody who’s never had to address someone as Ms. and have it be enforced as such, therefor…”. I’m sure I’ve met people titled Ms. but I’ve never been forced to go one way or the other, at least not to my conscious knowledge. It’s not a matter of never having met anyone titled Ms., it’s not having had to interact with them in a manner that requires me to call them Ms.
I don’t think this is exactly what you mean. People (regardless of gender) usually make their marriages public knowledge via big ceremonies and the display of wedding rings. Marital status as public knowledge is one aspect of marriage IMHO.
The reason the Miss/Mrs. thing is different is that it seems to imply something about the personal identity of the woman (Seriously, “Mrs. John Smith?” Gimme a break.) as subservient to that of the man. (Like you said, of course.)
FTR: I’m a married man and am glad my wife kept her maiden name.
No, I really am not putting forth anything remotely resembling an argument from ignorance. I have repeatedly said that I don’t think you’re lying. Did I type that in invisible ink or something?
What I’m saying is that I find it so hard to believe that you’ve never, to your knowledge met a Ms, but, at the same time, I don’t think you’re lying, so I’m weirded out. Do you honestly not get that? Your experience is really, really, really unusual.
The only time I’ve ever been refered to as “Master _____” was on wedding invitations when I was a kid and one high school teacher (who refered to girls as Miss ____). The only other places I’ve seen “Master” used was in a juvenile court.
Psh, in which case, I call out your username as being highly misleading.
I actually don’t find it that hard to believe. It wouldn’t surprise me if my college-age children had the same experience. All of their grade school teachers went by “Miss” or “Mrs”, and I think their high school teachers did as well. Their friend’s mothers at least tolerated the use of “Mrs.” Now that they are in college, they may encounter a “Ms”. Or maybe not- when I was in college, instructors were either “Dr X”, “Professor Y”, or “Just call me Bob”.
If asked, my title is Ms. It’s not so much that it’s none of your damn business whether I’m married or not; it’s that I am an individual, an adult person in my own right, and it doesn’t matter. Most of the time, my marital status is entirely irrelevant. I belong neither to my father nor to any other man. I belong to me, and since it’s me you’re interacting with, that’s fine. I can actually make my own decisions, don’t worry, I don’t have to get the patriarch’s permission. It’s also degrading; as if a woman materially changes in that moment of saying “I do” and needs a whole new definition, whereas a man is always just himself. If a man can be Mr his whole life and never have to reveal whether he’s managed to catch a woman yet, it’s only just that a woman should be afforded the same privilege. I don’t expect my marital status to be relevant to any discussion I may have with anyone other than a friend, and in that situation they can pretty much just call me Tea. (Obviously there may be occasions when someone needs to know, like for a mortgage or something. That’s different.)
Anyway. As SciFiSam mentioned, at work it’s Ms Teacake if I’m getting my whole name, but just “Miss, Miss, he’s trying to stab me” (or whatever) if I’m not. This applies to married and unmarried women in my workplace, and other schools, in my experience. I wonder if the women who don’t like Ms were those who are old enough to remember disliking their experience of the feminist movement of the seventies in general, and it’s younger women who are now taking it up. (I was not born until the end of the seventies, just so you know!)
I hope I’m making sense. It’s been a long week. Apologies if I’m rambling.
Not only that, but a lot of times on forms you can select Miss OR Ms. as your title.