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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5373 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes  Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 9 of 10 07 April 2011 at 5:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I always just skip that chapter. I don't have a lot of relatives.
I can even remember when I was little, I always found it difficult to work out what a cousin was, even in English.("it's your mum's brother's son" or whatever is surprisingly complicated when you don't have a frame of reference. And you're six). Edited by schoenewaelder on 07 April 2011 at 5:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 6969 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 10 of 10 07 April 2011 at 7:22pm | IP Logged | |||||
Northern Saami has a fairly intricate way of translating "aunt" and "uncle" too (like the Chinese languages it also gets hairy when accounting for nephews/nieces, grandchildren, cousins who aren't aunts or uncles and in-laws) áhkku = "grandmother", "grandparent's sister" (Ed. the second meaning for me as an English native-speaker would be "great-aunt") áddjá = "grandfather", "grandparent's brother" (Ed. the second meaning for me as an English native-speaker would be "great-uncle") oambealli = "female cousin" (~ "aunt" for me in some situations) vilbealli = "male cousin" (~ "uncle" for me in some situations) eanu = "mother's brother" (~ uncle), "mother's male cousin" (~ uncle), first cousin once-removed eahki = "father's older brother" (~ uncle), "father's male cousin" (~ uncle) čiehci = "father's younger brother (~ uncle) siessá = "father's sister" (~ aunt), "father's female cousin" (~ aunt) goaski = "mother's older sister" (~ aunt), "mother's older female cousin" (~ aunt) muoŧŧá = "mother's younger sister" (~ aunt), "mother's younger female cousin" (~ aunt) máhka = "brother-in-law", "uncle", "husband of a relative who is not a "sivjjot" (q.v.) or "spile" (q.v.) ipmi = "uncle's wife", "wife of any parent's male cousin" (~ aunt) sivjjot = "brother-in-law of a woman or girl", "sister-in-law of a man or boy" (or even relative of the opposite gender through marriage) ("uncle" in some situations) spile = "spouse of the wife's sibling" (unisex), "sister-in-law"
I think that intricate organization for kinship is tied to environmental pressure to preserve a family to optimize division of work or economic well-being. Having the terms specific for that many members on the tree seems to signal (implicitly or not) each person's "rank" or significance within the tree/unit/clan. It also seems more beneficial for a group of people linked by blood/some common ancestor to stick together when times are tough but external help isn't really available. In other words, one's relatives (not just the nuclear family) act as the primary social support network, including getting connections for social/professional advancement (which unfortunately can have the perverse outcomes from nepotism when it comes to professional advancement) or help of any sort. The current "Western" take with its lessened focus on the extended family seems to be abetted by a sense that the government has the prime "duty" to help (think pensions, day-care, welfare payments, unemployment allowances). In other words the perception that it's the family that has the "duty" to help out someone on the family tree is not as strong. Kinship terminology can be divided into six broad classes as illustrated in the first and second parts of a tutorial by an instructor at Palomar College. As an interesting exercise, look at the non-English versions of the Wikipedia article "Kinship". Many of these non-English versions include lists of terms assigned for members of the family. You can use Google Translate or a suitable dictionary to get the meaning of the terms (for the record I extracted the examples above from the version in Northern Saami ("Sámegiella"), and then used Álgu to get the meanings). 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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