stand on ceremony
stand on ceremony
To observe or adhere strictly or insistently to formalities or traditional protocol. We've all been acquainted already, so there's no need to stand on ceremony for this interview. Please, don't stand on ceremonies on my behalf—keep eating!
stand on ceremony
to hold rigidly to protocol or formal manners. (Often in the negative.) Please help yourself to more. Don't stand on ceremony. We are very informal around here. Hardly anyone stands on ceremony.
stand on ceremony
insist on the observance of formalities; behave formally.stand on ˈceremony
(British English) behave in a very formal way: Come on — don’t stand on ceremony! Start eating or the food will get cold!stand on ceremony, to
To behave very formally. This term, in which stand on has nothing to do with rising to one’s feet but rather means “to insist on,” dates from the nineteenth century. It appeared in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey (1798): “I never stand upon ceremony.”