The new Kinbank database lets you explore the global diversity of family and kinship terms. Compiled by an international team led by anthropologist Sam Passmore from The Australian National University, it’s providing new insights into kinship terms around the world. For example, although it’s long been assumed that most languages’ word that means “mother” starts with an M sound, such as mama or madre. But when the researchers looked at terms for parents in more than 1200 languages — most of them from New Guinea or Australia — they found that more than 40% of the parental words starting with an initial M sound referred not to the mother, but to the father. Another thing in the database: The Samoan word uso is used to refer to one’s same-gender sibling or cousin, or to someone you feel that kind of close kinship with. Uso has found its way into English-speaking areas with Samoan communities, both with that meaning and also to mean “Samoan” more generally. Sometimes it’s now rendered in English as uce. This is part of a complete episode.
It’s hard to remember how to spell the names of some cities. Tallahassee, Florida, for example. Then there are towns with very few letters to remember. Y, a tiny town in northern France, has only two main streets, which come together to form...
On a busy day in the emergency room, Alisa of Dallas, Texas, told an efficient colleague that she was really humming, meaning it as a compliment. Her colleague took offense, maintaining that humming meant “smelly.” Since the 18th...
Subscribe to the fantastic A Way with Words newsletter!
Martha and Grant send occasional messages with language headlines, event announcements, linguistic tidbits, and episode reminders. It’s a great way to stay in touch with what’s happening with the show.
