Quote:

Quote:

Then I'll go on using he-cousin and she-cousin.
With or without hyphen?



I should also add that some English speakers would find being called "he-cousin" or "she-cousin" mildly offensive, or irritating. Certainly here in NZ, the gender prefix conjures up associations with livestock.



You're right Sjmaxq (sorry) and thank you for using the word 'mildly'. It could be offensive , but I would never use this in official language. I just thought English is such an efficient language that I wondered why this could not be a one word clearness.


Faldage , I agree that must be it, The culture is accordingly:
When one mother dies, her sister takes all of her ten children into her family group (I know from African friends it works that way).

"If there were some important difference between male cousins and female cousins or between children of father's siblings and children of mother's siblings or between cross-cousins and parallel-cousins then we would have separate terms for them. Cultures in which there are important differences have separate terms. If a language uses the same word for one's own children and those of one's siblings' children it's probably because there is no important difference in that culture."