I’m paging through House of Leaves again (not an easy task), and I think the answer to the Will Navidson question is that it’s complicated. (Appropriately enough.) Characters in “The Navidson Record” section of the book are generally not named in a consistent fashion across characters, but are usually consistent individually. That is to say, most are referred to by the author/editor (as compared to in dialogue) by the same name each time, but he does not stick to the last-name-only method as part of an “editorial voice” decision. Will Navidson is called “Navidson” or “Will” at times (the latter often but not always when referring to him with his wife Karen, as in “Will and Karen”). Karen Green is nearly always called “Karen,” their kids by their first names. Billy Reston is referred to as “Reston,” but Holloway Roberts as “Holloway.”
What Will’s friends, wife, and own brother actually call him, to his face and to others, is “Navy,” short for “Navidson,” so I was wrong there. He himself even uses it when talking out loud to himself, in a “think, Navy, think!” sort of situation. One visitor asks Karen if a particular drawing had been done “by your Navy man.” (He was in the Army earlier in his life, before becoming a photographer, so his branch of the military doesn’t factor in.) So this still blows my mind.
My son-in-law seems to have learned to call people by last name only in law school, and now does it all the time. If you listen to Marketplace, it is also done in the Freakonomics segment every two weeks, if nowhere else.
IIRC, it was always Lt. Colombo, not just Colombo - but the only persons talking to him besides suspects were coroners or uniforms.
When I was in school, there were so many boys with the same first name as me, we all pretty much had to go by last name. Even my close group of friends had 3 out of the 4 of us with the same first name.
Once the 4th guy laughingly told me about the time called one of our other friends and when the mom answered he asked “Is Smith there?” which of course was absurd since everyone in the house was a Smith.
My housemate normally referred to her grandmothers as ‘Granny B’ (or Mrs B) and ‘Granny T’, even while talking to them. Does that count?
We didn’t use them as names at my (English girls’ school, bit posh) school, though my brother’s (boys’ school, even posher) school did, both teachers and students, though most of the boys dropped it after a year or so.
I don’t know any of my friends by surname, we just use weird nicknames to deal with the multiple Dave problem.
I’ve heard of using “sir” and “ma’am” with parents, but actually calling them that? Do you really mean they use it beyond the required “yes, sir” and “no, ma’am”? In my mind, the respectful use of those terms is different from actually calling people those terms. Is that not the same for you, or do you actually know kids who would say “Sir” instead of “Dad,” “Poppa,” “Father,” etc?
It varied by the teacher at my HS. The boys’ gym teacher used our surnames; the girls’ gym teacher used first names. Most teachers used first names. I had an near-retirment social studies teachers who’d call all the boys by our surnames (occasionaly with a Master in front) and all girls as Miss [surname]. The French teacher called us by our French names, until French IV (senior yr) when she started calling us M. or Mlle. [surname] and using vous, saying this was customary for French students in their final year of lycee. That lasted about two weeks.
Holmes and Watson always refer to one another by their last names. I believe this goes back to the English public (that is to say private) school education system.