[Lexicog] Another lexical gap

[Ron Moe]

Perhaps the dictionary makers should get together and agree on what the word
means. The American Heritage Dictionary gives the following:

brother-in-law n. 1. The brother of one's husband or wife. 2. The husband of
one's sister. 3. The husband of the sister of one's husband or wife.

This is how I use the word and it appears that others do too. In fact I had
never heard of brother-in-law or sister-in-law being used with a more
restricted meaning. Perhaps my view is due to a view of the family--that
husband and wife are one, and that a person marries into a family. So my
wife's sisters are now my sisters(-in-law). When they got married, their
husbands also became my brothers(-in-law). The most interesting aspect of
this discussion is how a cultural scenario and its attendant beliefs
determines a word's meaning and usage. This is one more confirmation that
the cognitive linguists are right--that words are related to a
schema/scenario, and that to define a word adequately we must account for
the scenario. In other words the AHD definitions above are inadequate. They
give the three referents for the word, but do not account for how the three
are logically related and why the word would cover three different sets of
people. The definition also does not account for why (apparently) some
people restrict the word to sense 1 and/or 2. (I'm not clear on which is the
"real" meaning.) The definition also does not account for why the brother of
my brother's wife is not my brother-in-law. He didn't marry into my family
and isn't one with one of my siblings or my wife's siblings. In other words,
since I and my wife are one, and our siblings and their spouses are one,
each of the three types of brother-in-law are one relationship removed from
me. But the brother of my brother's wife is two relationships removed from
me. Therefore he doesn't qualify.

The same thinking is behind the terms 'aunt' and 'uncle'. My mother's sister
is my aunt. But my mother's sister's husband is also my uncle. I would
introduce them as 'my aunt and uncle', not as 'my aunt and her husband' or
'my aunt and uncle-in-law'. So the cultural belief that husband and wife are
one explains the usage of more than one kinship term.

Of course there is more to English kinship terms than I've covered here, but
I'll stop.

Ron


-----Original Message-----
From: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
[mailto:lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com]On Behalf Of David Tuggy
Sent: Monday, June 06, 2005 2:20 PM
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Lexicog] Another lexical gap


Many of us do that, I think.

--David Tuggy

fieldworks_support at sil.org wrote:

> In the area of "brother/sister in law", I've deliberately chosen to
> disobey
> the dictionary definition and include the spouses of my wife's siblings as
> brothers and sisters-in-law.
>
>
> Steve White, Jaars language software support
> 704-843-6337, 1-800-215-7813
>



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