Of possible interest to HNers, kinship terminology of different cultures is a subject that has a very elegant taxonomy. It was a major line of inquiry in early modern sociology, which tried to link other attributes of how societies were structured to how they named relations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinship_terminology
Something I find sad about this is that many people really don’t know how to think about themselves in that context; in this way we aren’t a someone to other people so much as a something.
I know this isn’t a firm rule, but there are many people in my life who I’m certain wouldn’t have a good grasp of how they fit into their family and community beyond fairly superficial platitudes.
Maybe this has been true in the past as well. I wouldn’t know.
Back then almost everyone was a peasant so you wouldn't get any information about their interests, social status, etc. from just their career like you (somewhat) do now.
People still do this in small US towns. Your last name defines who you are to the town heritage. If you have the wrong last name, then you don't matter.
As non-contrarian as it sounds, I'd argue that as someone who came from a small town, having to define yourself by your "tribe" last name is worse, because if it the "wrong" last name, there's nothing you can do about it. You can, within reason, change what you do for a living.
Sure, I could logically make that connection. But I guess comparing it to something like Nigerian where all friends/family of an equal level are "brother"/"sister" or higher level "aunty"/"uncle", it seems weird to see English flattened so much. The language is specific to level (grand), node depth (x removed) and colinears (brother, sister, cousin, 2nd cousin, etc) that you can accurately describe pretty much any lineage.
When you compare it like that, it gets the author's point across even better to show how the language and culture play into each other. That being that anglophone cultures are very cold/distant to the importance of family on your life, outside of social convention (and how important that structure/convention is); while others (Hawaiian or Nigerian, for instance) treat family as a fluid and inviting unit of kinship.
You see this in the more "warm cultured" English regions (a good chunk of the US, Australia, etc) where it's common to refer to family friends as "aunt"/"uncle", or "cousin"; almost in defiance of the linguistic history.
In other words, I think the topic is fascinating and deserves even more depth compared to how it was broken down there.
> I guess comparing it to something like Nigerian where all friends/family of an equal level are "brother"/"sister" or higher level "aunty"/"uncle", it seems weird to see English flattened so much.
I don’t know what you mean by ‘Nigerian’, but that sounds to me like a Hawaiian kinship system, which is different to the Eskimo kinship system found in English.
> The language is specific to level (grand), node depth (x removed) and colinears (brother, sister, cousin, 2nd cousin, etc) that you can accurately describe pretty much any lineage.
My understanding of the kinship system classifications is that they’re focussed on the most basic terms. You can refer to ‘my mother’s father’s sister’s son’ in pretty much any language, but it’s most interesting to see which terms are considered basic (because that in turn reveals ‘how language and culture play into each other’, as you say).
Interestingly, when we were hosting some Ukrainian refugees recently, "sister" or "brother" could refer to a literal sibling or a cousin. I was unaware of different kinship terminologies until today (thanks again, HN), but that kind of nomenclature is similar to the Hawaiian system.
