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Mama for mother nearly universal? | ||
Tags: French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Al-Malik Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member United Kingdom arabicgenie.com Joined 7134 days ago 221 posts - 294 votes  1 sounds Speaks: English*, German*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Dutch, French, Arabic (classical) Studies: Mandarin, Persian | Message 9 of 39 02 March 2006 at 7:09pm | IP Logged | ||
That's interesting, especially since "nan" is sometimes used for "grandmother" in English, i.e. another close relative. In Arabic the word for mother is "Umm", and the parental uncle is " 'amm ". So similar sounds to mama for two close relatives. I think in Pashto "mama" means uncle, probably only for maternal uncles. I think the same applies to Bengali. In Persian the affectionate term for mother is "maman" or "mama", although this is probably imported from French. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Eidolio Bilingual Octoglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 6861 days ago 159 posts - 164 votes 2 sounds Speaks: Dutch*, Flemish*, French, English, Latin, Ancient Greek, Italian, Greek | Message 10 of 39 03 March 2006 at 11:39am | IP Logged | ||
hm this is weird, "oma" means grandmother in Dutch - exactly the same word ?!?! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7156 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 11 of 39 03 March 2006 at 1:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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Some examples from Starostin's online database:
mair (Armenian) | mat' (Russian) | Mutter (German) | maathir (Old Irish) | maacer (Tocharian) eme = old woman (Turkish - dialect) | ama = female (Chuvash) | emgen = wife (Khalkha - official language of Mongolia) | eme = woman (Dongxian - spoken by some Mongols in China) | emeke = mother-in-law (Literary Manchu) | am = woman, wife, female (Korean) | me-sú = female (Japanese) ema (Estonian) | eme = sow (Hungarian) | ämä (Selkup - language spoken in Siberia) ammaa (Tamil) | amma (Telugu) amaama (Inuktitut - dialect) ?em (Hebrew) | ?umm (Arabic) mu (Mandarin) (not the same as 'ma') mia = wife (Thai) -maa (Bantu) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kubelek Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland chomikuj.pl/Kuba_wal Joined 6852 days ago 415 posts - 528 votes Speaks: Polish*, EnglishC2, French, Spanish Studies: German | Message 12 of 39 06 March 2006 at 8:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can add Polish, though it's not a big surprise:
matka/mama - mother/mum ojciec/tata - father/dad - the oral front consonant applies it's hard to take it for different member of the family: wujek/wuj/wujo - uncle (most common forms) ciocia/ciotka - aunt babcia - grandmother dziadek - grandfather 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ulixes Diglot Newbie Italy Joined 6813 days ago 1 posts - 1 votes Speaks: Italian, Albanian* | Message 13 of 39 31 March 2006 at 10:06pm | IP Logged | ||
True, but informally "mami" or "mama" is used. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Mga Groupie United States beastie.redirectme.n Joined 7123 days ago 67 posts - 66 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Arabic (Written) | Message 14 of 39 30 April 2006 at 12:44am | IP Logged | ||
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According to The World's Major Languages (p.9), "mama" means "father" in Georgian, and "deda" means "mother".
Of course, Georgian is not an Indo-European language. Edited by Mga on 30 April 2006 at 12:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| desert_daisy Newbie Australia Joined 6933 days ago 14 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian, Arabic (Written) | Message 15 of 39 03 May 2006 at 3:39pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can add "ammi" from Sinhala. :-)
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| sayariza Triglot Groupie Indonesia Joined 6763 days ago 42 posts - 54 votes Speaks: Malay, Indonesian*, DutchC1 Studies: EnglishC2 | Message 16 of 39 24 May 2006 at 1:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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in Indonesian:
Amak / emak = mother pak = father nenek = grandma kakek = grandpa kakak = big sister/ big brother mbak = big sister adik = little sister/ little brother Edited by sayariza on 24 May 2006 at 1:22pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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