Dyadic kinship term

Dyadic kinship terms (

in-laws: co-mothers-in-law, co-fathers-in-law, co-brothers-in-law, co-sisters-in-law, co-grandmothers, and co-grandfathers

.

Examples of dyadic terms for blood kin include Kayardild (Australian) ngamathu-ngarrba "mother and child", derived from ngamathu "mother", and kularrin-ngarrba "brother and sister", from kularrin "cross-sibling", with the dyadic suffix -ngarrba. Not all such terms are derived; the Ok language Mian has a single unanalysable root lum for "father and child".^[1]

Dyadic blood-kin terms are rare in Indo-European languages. Examples are Icelandic and Faroese, which have the terms feðgar "father and son", feðgin "father and daughter", mæðgin "mother and son", mæðgur "mother and daughter".^[1]

Chinese and Japanese use compound nouns to make dyadic terms, such as (in Japanese) 親子 oyako "parent and child", 兄弟 kyōdai "brothers; siblings", 姉妹 shimai "sisters", and 夫婦 fūfu "husband and wife".

The languages which have such terms are concentrated in the western Pacific. There are at least ten in New Guinea, including

Gǀwi) in southern Africa.^[1]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c Evans, Nicholas. 2006. "Dyadic Constructions." In Keith Brown (ed.) Encyclopaedia of Language and Linguistics (2nd Edition).
^ The Oksapmin Kinship System Archived 2009-09-20 at the Wayback Machine, retrieved May 21, 2009.

[ELL-1] Evans, Nicholas. 2006. "Dyadic Constructions." In Keith Brown (ed.) Encyclopaedia of Language and Linguistics (2nd Edition).

[2] The Oksapmin Kinship System Archived 2009-09-20 at the Wayback Machine, retrieved May 21, 2009.

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