Ok, please explain this cousin thing to me again

Factual Questions
21

[QUOTE=Panurge]
I am sorry if my comment seemed offensive - it was certainly not meant to be. I used Hindi as an example not because it is “your language”, but because I am currently struggling to learn it, and because I find it interesting the more “distant” kinship terms seem to be considered close enough to warrant individual names. This is to me - a Danish speaker - terribly hard to learn.
Danish, by the way, has the same horrible “cousin” thing going on as English, and I am still very confused by it. I use the terms very rarely, but if I had more need for them, I would probably prefer a system where each successive link was given a new term.
[/QUOTE]

Then I am sorry for being a little :dubious: and I speak Hindi quite well. Please e-mail me if you’d like - it’s in my profile - and I’d be glad to help in any way I can.
I am impressed that you are learning Hindi, though - awesome.

Mal, I’m not sure either. I never claimed to be stupid, but I certainly am no genius. Family trees in general confuse the heck out of me. And I have tons of extended family…I just listen to whatever my family tells me. “This is your father’s cousin, you can call him your tauu” - the word for father’s brother, even though he is not actually a brother.

22

Hey, thanks Anaamika - I might just do that one day. (actually I have been lazy with the Hindi lately. There is little chance of me going to India for the next year or two, so right now I mainly study it to be able to read Braj - an older dialect og Hindi from the Ganga-Jamuna Doab. Still, I could probably use a tip or two once in a while.)
As for your question about why each branch of the family tree doesn’t have its own name in English, I think an answer might be found in the fact that - as Santo Rugger points out - we don’t need a detailed nomenclature unless we’re genealogists or members of a royal family somewhere. This could be connected to the way our lives are organized in the “west”, where the extended family rarely is the primary social unit. In India and in other societies where family ties plays a very real and important part of the lives of people, the need to differentiate beyond the term “cousin” is a lot greater.

23

[QUOTE=Don’t Call Me Shirley]
There is no “twice removed.”
[/QUOTE]

Wouldn’t your first cousin-once-removed’s kids be first cousins twice removed? Or your grandparen’ts first cousin? That’s how I understand it.

From here.

24

[QUOTE=Anaamika]
Part of my confusion comes from the fact that in my family, in Hindi, we don’t use the word cousin - they are brothers or sisters, or, if you want to distinguish, it’s “Uncle Kuldeep’s kids”.
[/QUOTE]
Ahh… this, combined with Panurge’s link is illuminating. (The link I note has specific names for many relationships, but not for cousins – various types of uncles and aunts, but not the children of those).

My young son’s (Fiji) Indian friend has referred several times to “brothers” that we know he doesn’t have, and had figured out they were probably actually (first) cousins. Appears this could be translation related. Cool. :slight_smile:

25

[QUOTE=Santo Rugger]
Why can’t we just call it, “that stuff you put in your car that makes it go”? Then we wouldn’t know if you were talking about gasoline or diesel. The nomenclature makes it more precise, by describing more accurately what you’re talking about. It may not have much use to you or me, but I’m sure there are people for whom it does (royalty, genealogists, etc.)

FWIW, my family usually uses your method, making first cousins once removed into second cousins. I guess it’s just something that developed due to a need for it, and doesn’t really affect the layperson.

ETA**: Mal**, I think Ana means, why doesn’t my cousin give birth to my second cousin, who gives birth to my cousin, etc.
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Hmm… so that way, my cousin’s kids would be my kids’ third cousins, while their kids in turn would be mine. Makes a kind of sense, but conveys slightly less information than the way we actually do it.

Of course, when I was a lad it was reasonably common to call adult acquaintances “Uncle” and “Auntie” anyway. “Uncle Jan” was just my Dad’s Dutch friend, and no kin whatever (a close enough friend to put me and my sister up for a week’s holiday once, though).

26

some cultures really don’t make a difference between actual siblings and first cousins. first cousins are considered by blood as close as a whole or half sibling.

debate still rages on whether james is jesus’ full/half/step/brother or cousin.

in russian you could translate it as other sister/brother or second sister/brother.

27

[QUOTE=Don’t Call Me Shirley]
AIUI, every time there is another generation, it goes like this: first cousin, first cousin once removed, second cousin, second cousin once removed, third cousin, third cousin once removed… There is no “twice removed.”
[/QUOTE]

That is false. See cite. A relation can be twice removed or thrice removed.

I can understand why it would be confusing if it’s never been explained to you, but damn, people, don’t make out like someone’s trying to trick you. It’s crystal-clear and unambiguous. If you go over it once or twice you’ll get it.

Why do we have relational descriptors? It’s an concise answer to the question “How is this person related to you?” A total stranger does not have time to go through a long-winded spiel about how he is your mother’s father’s son’s grandson. “First cousin once removed” does the trick nicely.

28

[QUOTE=Anaamika]
Why can’t we just call them “Julia’s and Mickey’s” kids?

What I mean to say is, what use is this nomenclature? I’ve met very few people who are truly at home with this in their own families…they usually just say “here are my cousin’s kids” or whatever.
[/QUOTE]

In everyday life, people usually just say " here are my cousin’s kids" or “Steve is my mother’s cousin” if they feel any need to clarify the relationship. There’s no real need to get into all the details most of the time. There a few areas where more precision is needed and in those cases, it’s easier to say “X is Y’s second cousin” instead of " X’s grandmother is A ,who is Y’s father’s sister".

29

I like to go down the tree from the last common ancestor.

Parents’ kids = your brothers/sisters

Grandparents’ kids = your aunts/uncles
Grandparents’ grandkids = your first cousins

Great grandparents’ kids = your great aunts/uncles
Great grandparents’ grandkids = your first cousins once removed
Great grandparents’ great grandkids = your second cousins
Great great grandparents’ kids = your great great aunts/uncles
Great great grandparents’ grandkids = your first cousins twice removed
Great great grandparents’ great grandkids = your second cousins once removed
Great great grandparents’ great great grand kids = your third cousins

etc.

Summary:
(1) N steps down from the point of divergence = “(N-1)th cousins”
(2) G generations different from you = “G times removed”

Note that in (1) you’re counting how many steps down the older cousin is from the point of divergence.

30

[QUOTE=Panurge]
The English language is confusing? - I imagine that your parents already had a pretty good faculty for differentiating a variety of kinship terms: - Hindi, it seems, is even worse than English. A nightmare for any student of the language..
[/QUOTE]

My problem with the English system is that it starts out as if generations and genders are important. Aunt is a different word from uncle which is a different word from niece. Grandmother is different from granddaughter. Then suddenly the relationships turn symmetric and asexual. Who the hell is my first cousin twice removed? That could be my grandma’s first cousin of either gender OR it could be my first cousin’s grandchild of either gender. I have BOTH still living but one’s an infant girl and the other’s a geriatric man – I simply refuse to use the same term of kinship for them. It sounds as retarded as using the term “uncle” for uncles, aunts, nieces and nephews — aaw, who’s my cute little uncle, she’s so adorable :rolleyes: .

In general I consider the Russian language to be pretty abysmal at approachability, but this is one of the only things I consider easing in Russian. All the kinship terms consist of a primary term and an optional prefix modifier (second, third, etc.) Translated to English the system would look as follows
There’s you, there’s your mom, dad, grandpa, grandma, aunt, uncle, newphew, niece, brother and sister.

Your aunt and uncle’s kids are your “second brothers and sisters” (also called cousins), and their kids are in turn your “second nieces and nephews”.

Your grandparents siblings are your “second grandmothers and grandfathers”. Their kids (who are your parents cousins, “second brothers and sisters”) are your “second aunts and uncles”. Their kids are your “third brothers and sisters”, and their kids are your “third nieces and nephews”.

So in short there’s a ‘nature of the relationship’ that reflects gender and generation, and there’s the degree which indicates degree of relation (albeit a losing alignment because of existence of terms for aunts and uncles instead of having ‘second mom and dad’)

31

There was a better chart posted on this issue on here a few months ago, anyone remember? It was similar to the one on wikipedia, but it actually broke it down even more than sharing grandparents.

32

Anaa has a brother. Let’s call him Joe.

Anaa has a son, David. Joe has a daughter, Kimberly. David and Kimberly are first cousins.

David falls in love, gets married, has a son, Mark. Kimberly falls in love, gets married, has a daughter, Jessica. Mark and Jessica are second cousins.

David/Jessica and Kimberly/Mark are first cousins, once removed.

33

It’s not just genealogists and royals who need this kind of terminology. I come from a very large extended family, and notations like this are essential to keep straight who’s who at a family gathering. We’ve even added a few new terms to the standard ones: For instance, one’s “turkey cousins” are the cousins of one’s cousins on the other side (to whom one is not directly related by blood).

34

[QUOTE=Anaamika]
Ok, so next question - why is it like this? It would make more sense if each succeeding generation was named by a new name - so first cousins give birth to second cousins who give birth to third cousins…
I love the English language but damn it can be confusing…and I was schooled here. I can’t imagine how tough it was for my parents.
[/QUOTE]

Personally I think it’s because people who speak English love to play with the language, but Bob suggests that it might have to do with inheritance laws. I don’t think I’ve heard anyone actually use the terms in casual conversation unless there’s a family reunion going on.
Here’s the programmer’s take on the naming convention:

Find the first common ancestor.
Count the number of generations from that ancestor to the oldest generation. Subtract 1, and that’s the cousin’s ordinal - first, second, third…

Now, count the number of generations between the older generation and the younger generation - that’s the “removed”

So, if Joe and Mary’s common ancestor is two generations above both of them (parents and grandparents), they are first cousins.

But if Joe and Mary’s common ancestor is three generations older than Joe, and five generations older than Mary, they are second cousins (Joe’s generation count), twice removed (the difference between Joe and Mary’s generation)

35

Anaamika, if you read through this thread very carefully, you will see there are subtle differences in opinions on how it works. (One person claimed there is NO “twice removed”.) I have to agree that wikipedia does a good job explaining it.

If it helps, try drawing out a simple example with horizontal lines representing the same generation, and vertical lines leading to the next generation…working your way down the page. I’d show enough lines to account for 3-4 generations. Often, a diagram can help clarify the confusion.

When in doubt, you can’t go wrong simply calling them “cousin” right? :wink:

36

I have a relative who is a second cousin once removed on my dad’s side and a first cousin once removed on my mom’s (no incest inolved - my dad’s first cousin’s son and my mom’s sister’s daughter had a kid)

Brian

37

[QUOTE=Jinx]
When in doubt, you can’t go wrong simply calling them “cousin” right? :wink:
[/QUOTE]

I’m not entirely clear what use is a system denoting how many generations somebody is away, but not in what direction. Am I missing something about how it works? I mean nobody says “I have a 15 year age difference with <blank>” unless it’s clear in which direction from context. How do you specify that you have a cousin that’s removed older vs. removed younger without explicitly stating it in a long explanatory sentence?

And even then, I have a relative who in Russian is my “secondary nephew”. He is my first cousin’s son so that makes him my first cousin once removed, I suppose. He is older than I am yet he is removed in the younger direction. So I guess that would complicate things as well.

38

[QUOTE=Chronos]
It’s not just genealogists and royals who need this kind of terminology. I come from a very large extended family, and notations like this are essential to keep straight who’s who at a family gathering. We’ve even added a few new terms to the standard ones: For instance, one’s “turkey cousins” are the cousins of one’s cousins on the other side (to whom one is not directly related by blood).
[/QUOTE]
So, does the “turkey” have to go in the right place? For example, would my second cousin’s first cousin twice removed be my “second cousin turkey first cousin twice removed”? :wink:
ETA: Did you guys name them “turkey cousins” because you only see them at thanksgiving?

39

[QUOTE=Anaamika]
Why can’t we just call them “Julia’s and Mickey’s” kids?
[/quote]

You can.

Because it gives you a choice. If you have no need to be specific, you can just say “X’s kids” or “my cousins.” If you want a higher level of specificity, you can get into the “Xth cousin, X times removed” nomenclature.

And I don’t know about Hindi, but in Bengali you have the same deal. You can be general and say “this is my brother” or you can use the slightly more specific “Uncle X’s son” or you can use a term that is far more specific: “this is my brother by way of my father’s elder brother.”