Who are you anyway? A Brief Look at Kinship Terminology

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Family gatherings often provoke somewhat mixed emotions. The initial pleasantries and accompanying small talk slowly develop into cheerful conversation, only to abruptly die as someone makes a distasteful joke or decides to resurrect a long forgotten feud. In the midst of it all I sometimes wonder who these people are at all. After meeting my fiftieth cousin of the night, I crave a less nebulous and all-encompassing term – a word that describes what exactly my connection to this previously unknown individual is. Such is the struggle of speakers of languages using the Inuit (formerly Eskimo) kinship system.

In linguistics, kinship terminology refers to the words used in a speech community to identify relationships between individuals in a family. Although the categorisation mechanism used in whichever language we happen to speak may appear intuitive, it is really quite arbitrary and intrinsically linked to culture. There is no reason why our mother’s brother’s daughter and father’s sister’s son should both be our cousins other than that European societies have traditionally emphasised the nuclear family as an independent social and economic unit.

There is of course some variation among European languages. Swedish for example distinguishes between maternal and paternal grandparents, while Bulgarian has words to highlight relative age among siblings, yet they are united by a lack of endeavour to differentiate members outside of the nuclear family.

Even more broadly, Hawaiian kinship terminology only distinguishes between sex and generation. Cousins are brothers and sisters, aunts are mothers, and uncles are fathers. This is in fact the most common kinship system, occurring in around a third of societies, although these are typically small.
 
At the other extreme, the Sudanese kinship system is incredibly descriptive and complex with no two types of relatives sharing the same term. From a single term one can determine an individual’s generation, gender and the nature of their relation to ego (the person to whom all kinship relationships are referred). Although named for the people of present-day South Sudan, this system used to be incredibly common existing even in ancient Anglo-Saxon society.
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Intriguingly, despite the world’s great linguistic diversity there appears to be only a handful of systems of kinship terminology. Aside from the aforementioned, there exists also the Crow, Dravidian, Iroquois and Omaha systems. Perhaps this is unsurprising. Although one could envisage many tens of variants of the identified kinship systems, one would simultaneously find it difficult to justify why a language would develop a separate term for a father’s brother, yet no other uncle.

Again, differing kinship terminology is an inherently cultural phenomenon. The Iroquois system for example is hypothesised to distinguish between cross-cousins and parallel-cousins as the former were considered more desirable marriage partners in those societies. Even in the modern world, kinship terminology appears indicative of mentality. Speakers of languages with less descriptive and more classificatory kinship terminology appear to exhibit more concern for individuals in their wider society only demonstrating inordinate altruism to members of the immediate family. The opposite is true of speakers of languages with more descriptive systems who will make great sacrifices for members of the in-group, but show lower levels of concern for outsiders. Whether kinship terminology influences behaviour or is simply a reflection of cultural norms remains a matter of great debate.

Nonetheless, the fact that a social construct as universal and ubiquitous as the family can be defined in such a plethora of different ways challenges our ideas of normality. More than a quick glance in the dictionary, translation often requires careful consideration and a deep cultural understanding.
of the in-group, but show lower levels of concern for outsiders. Whether kinship terminology influences behaviour or is simply a reflection of cultural norms remains a matter of great debate.

Nonetheless, the fact that a social construct as universal and ubiquitous as the family can be defined in such a plethora of different ways challenges our ideas of normality. More than a quick glance in the dictionary, translation often requires careful consideration and a deep cultural understanding.

                                                          MICHAEL HENDLE (LINGUISTICS EDITOR)