august [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
everytime people talk about teto i get really confused because Тето means 'Uncle (father's side)' in Macedonion and i really confusedly imagine people referring to their uncle on their father's side
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
Macedonian is interesting to me in the regard that there's seperate words for uncles and aunts depending on which side of the parents they're on for you. i wonder how the need for them arose?
actually, there's three i can think of for Uncle: Вујче/Тето/Чичо.
Because when you go a generation further, there's only one words for Grandma (Баба, 'Baba') and only one word for Grandpa (Дедо, 'Dedo'), and you also call your great uncles and aunts and random old people on the street etc. Баба/Дедо.
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
If I find capacity to research if there's similarities to other close languages like Serbian or Bulgarian with regards to the aunt/uncle system, this too could become a blog post. xD
Show threadscy

@august Most Germans don't know this, but the German language had that too:

Today, it's Onkel (uncle) and Tante (aunt) regardless of which side of your parents they're from.

But we also have Oheim (which is widely regarded as an archaic word for uncle, but originally meant maternal uncles only) and Muhme (maternal aunt).

Vetter and Base are uncommon words for cousins (male & female) these days, but could also refer to paternal uncles and aunts back in the day.

#German #GermanLanguage

1:40pmWeb
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
@scy oh wow, as a (supposed) German native speaker i didn't know that! I've heard the word 'Oheim' before, and I assumed 'Vetter' was Austrian, but that's so interesting to hear!
is there a special reason you might know of as to why they're not used anymore/they faded from common speech?
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
@scy i also wanna point out that strangely, Macedonian does not have a cousin gender/side of family distinction. one acts like everyone is siblings and then calls honorifics dependent on the age relationship, Даде/Бато for older sister/brother, and [name] for the younger sibling/cousin etc.. It's close to the Korean system except there's no honorifics for the younger part and it isn't dependent on the younger speaker's gender.
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
@scy being nonbinary in Macedonian sucks for this very reason: literally every interaction needs to be gendered somehow, and i only know of two options.
Show threadscy9h ago

@august As a person who passes as and was socialized cis male (but feels somewhat graygender), this might be the first time that I've actually realized how much gendered terms for all kinds of relatives are a problem for non-binary people, not just in Macedonian¹ /o\

¹ which I don't speak. I only know one word in Macedonian, пичка 🙈 Please don't ask me why 😅

Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
@scy that's a good word to know in Macedonian :D should you want to know more (swear or non-swear), feel free to ask!
as someone who'd prefer gender-neutral terms for most interactions/terms of relation, Macedonian sucks a lot >_< I can't even say 'I'm good' without providing information about my gender :(
Show threadaugust [0x08] 🏳️‍⚧️🇲🇰9h ago
@scy anecdote, even though I go for male-adjacent terms most of the time when possible (unless I'm with family, they're very conservative), I let my younger sister call me Даде willingly because it's not attached to gender for me anymore, just for what my sister and sometimes my gf [minimally younger than me] is '''''supposed''''/allowed/encouraged to call me
Show threadscy9h ago
@august awww, that's sweet :)
Show threadscy9h ago

@august I don't, sorry. I just vaguely remembered that there was something similar going on in German as well and put together my reply from Wiktionary entries 😅

My guess would be a) who cares about which side they're from, or b) to reduce the number of special terms for simplification. (Or a combination of both.)

I mean, "maternal" and "paternal" as prefixes to uncles, aunts, cousins etc. work universally in case you actually do need to make that distinction.

Show threadDaniel Bohrer8h ago

@scy @august languages are so interesting, and although I still consider German my native one, I didn't know about the "Onkel/Oheim" and "Tante/Muhme" split!

I know from Mandarin that there are different terms for "older brother" (哥哥, gēge) and "younger brother" (弟弟, dìdi), as well as "older sister" (姐姐, jiějie) and "younger sister" (妹妹, mèimei) as well, like you mentioned for Macedonian

Show threadDaniel Bohrer5h ago
@scy @august (interestingly, this was the topic of my Duolingo session in Dutch today:)
Show threadJay8h ago

@scy @august Swedish is very pragmatic and just forms portmanteaus of mother/father and brother/sister.

morbror - maternal uncle
moster - maternal aunt
farbror - paternal uncle
faster - paternal aunt

Show threadLangerJan8h ago
@scy @august Most of my passive German vocabulary I owe to the translators of Lord Of the Rings („Oheim“ is Sam’s Godfather somehow) and Dr. Erika Fuchs