Chinese New Year is coming, there will be a lot of visiting among relatives if you have a Chinese partner or family. Facing the strange faces that look alike, sometimes you do not know how to call each of them. The situation is just overwhelming, and it may put you into embarrassment if you “misname” someone in the family…Well, we understand that you are not impolite.
The correct appellation does not only show your respect to others, but also represents your cultural awareness. Let’s talk about kinship terminology in Chinese today for you to make use of soon.
Chinese Kinship System
As we know, Chinese people have paid great attention to the distinction between males and females(男女有别 nánnǚ yǒubié), the senior and the junior(长幼有序 zhǎngyòu yǒuxù), the internal and the external(内外有分 nèiwài yǒufēn). Traditionally, we take male as the core of the family. Chinese classify relatives according to the 5 principles below:
- Position in a family hierarchy
- Seniority of the other peers
- Maternal and paternal line
- Affinity and consanguinity
- Collateral series and lineal series
The Chinese kinship system has used a lot of descriptive terms. If we look at it according to age, only for males of the same generation as father’s, we have five appellations: “伯父”, “叔父”, “姑父”, “舅父” and ”姨夫”.
There are as many as eight appellations for our own peers, namely, “堂兄”, ”堂弟”, ”堂姐”, ”堂妹”, ”表弟”, ”表哥”, ”表姐” and ”表妹”. Our next generation is also divided into ”甥 shēng (nephew or niece of mother’s side)” or “侄 zhí (nephew or niece of father’s side)”.
If we count it according to the maternal parent, we have other different names in the mother’s family. Mother’s parents become “外婆 wài gōng” and ”外公 wài pó”…etc. In a word, Chinese appellation is too detailed…
Western Kinship System
Have you wondered if we can just sum up all Chinese relatives in a word like “uncle” or “aunty” in western countries?
People from different countries have different definitions of kinship. While Chinese appellation uses descriptive way, western cultures prefer “classificatory method” which divides the family members by position in the family hierarchy based on five class: grandparent, parent, children, brothers and sisters, grandchildren.
All relatives of the same generation use the same appellation. For example, “cousin” could be father’s brother’s son, or mother’s brother’s daughter. Whether they have the same surname or not, as long as they are our “peers”, we call them “cousin”.
Why Chinese kinship so complicated?
The evolution of Chinese kinship system is very different from that of westerners. In ancient times, the relationship between father, his brothers, or his nephew and son was not obvious. It was only in Wei, Jin and the Southern and Northern Dynasties(220-589) that people gathered and gradually formed into big families to protect themselves due to frequent wars.
In addition to war, another factor is about the tradition: it is very impolite to call someone’s name directly. In order to accurately address a particular relative without calling his or her family name, people should divide them into different titles according to age, seniority, lineage…etc, and add “大”, “二”, “三” and “小” in front of them to indicate the ranking.
Although China’s kinship system is one of the most complex in the world, due to the decline in the number of population by industrialization and urbanization, and the influence of western culture, this system is gradually disappearing…
Meeting each other is a kind of destiny. I hope during the New Year, you can get together with the people you want to see and cherish the time of reunion!
