Re: OT: Language & clans? Re: OT: Ukraine

Chris Bates scripsit:

> It's similar to the way family terms and what they cover vary from
> language to language depending on what's required and what people think
> its important to disguish in conversation,
These are both more variable and more systematic than you probably think.
http://www.umanitoba.ca/anthropology/tutor/kinterms/termsys.html is an
excellent resource on the various systems of kinship terminology used
around the world.

> (I doubt many languages commonly employ family terms that span
> different generations, for instance a word that means "brother"/"uncle"
> seems unlikely to me. The exception I'd say is the very general eg
> "relative").
Terms for siblings aren't normally conflated with terms for people in
other generations, no.  But Omaha-type systems have a single term for
"male member of mother's patrilineage", and so conflate your mother's
brother with his sons, grandsons, etc.  Crow-type systems, which are
the mirror-image of Omaha-type, similarly have a single term for "male
member of father's matrilineage".

> The group ("Us versus Them") mentality is firmly ingrained in all
> human beings, as much as the desire to sleep or eat or drink, so I
> think every language will be able to express roughly the same concepts
> relating to the group/clan with the details changing depending on the
> exact way that families, the political system etc are experienced by
> speakers of that language.
It's probably true that all kinship systems have distinct terms for
father, mother, son, daughter, brother, and sister, plus terms for
more distant kin, but exactly which subset of relatives can be called
by any of these terms is very variable.  There are even systems in
which kinship terms are used reciprocally in certain cases: you call
your <whatever> by the same word he or she calls you.

--
John Cowan  www.ccil.org/~cowan  www.reutershealth.com  jcowan@reutershealth.com
We want more school houses and less jails; more books and less arsenals;
more learning and less vice; more constant work and less crime; more
leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of
the opportunities to cultivate our better natures.  --Samuel Gompers

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