Here’s a random thought 💭
Whenever I use the term “family” I could either mean my parents and siblings OR my wife and kids. In the hundreds thousand years of human civilization, certainly we must have come up with two different words to describe both types at some point in history, perhaps an ancient culture in the past has done it.
Replies (8)
Yeah of course, in Chinese, Arabic, or Slavic languages there are those kinds of distinctions.
I guess it’s just the English language lagging behind.
English is relatively new as a language. Kinda like Swahili,
In English you can also say 'Family of orientation' and 'Family of procreation'. Those are the scientific terms.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but just because a word in a particular language has many meanings and contexts does not mean that the language lacks other words that are more specific
English is a very precise language
Yeah I don’t really pay attention to language much so I’m not an expert whatsoever but I do pay attention to inconvenience. There is obviously scientific expressions to distinguish but everyday casual conversation shouldn’t be so technical I think. Arabic and Somali have a single word to describe maternal aunt but imagine saying maternal aunt to a random person in a random conversation, I really want to try and avoid being pretentious as much as I can lol
The word “family” to me was always interesting because it’s ALWAYS contentious. You could use scientific definitions but everyday casual conversations don’t work like that. People will always say things like family is the most important thing, but that means different for everybody. Some will go as far as include the tribe, some aunts and uncles, some extended members etc. You also have the mother vs wife thing. Now that I’m thinking about it, Arabic and Somali languages have a way of distinguishing between them but English is just way too broad. Even in legal documents, you have the assumption that your family is your wife and children.
😂 ... that emoji, nostr:npub1l7j9s2znwsfcezul4635gnezjg52t7x88efrdehm8h5sp7r6yu4qqfkujm
I know right 😂😂
