#41876
09/17/2001 6:08 AM
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How would you make parents-in-law possessive? Parents'-in-law, parents-in-law's, or parents-in-laws'.
And this hardly seems worth starting a new thread over, so I'll put it here.
Another site gives as their word today misoneism, meaning hatred of innovation. Would this make a hatred of Japanese soups misomisoism?
Bingley
Bingley
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#41877
09/17/2001 8:00 AM
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#41878
09/17/2001 4:37 PM
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addict
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How would you make parents-in-law possessive? Parents'-in-law, parents-in-law's, or parents-in-laws'
I'd use the highlighted choice above, but only if forced. I would more likely say something like, "We stayed at my wife's parents' house." And even then I'd use my wife's name if I thought the person I was talking to would know who I was talking about.
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#41879
09/17/2001 5:03 PM
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Let's start with the singular first. "I stayed at my mother-in-law's house" sounds fine to me and looks OK too. So, from that, we come to either parents-in-law's house or parents-in-laws' house. Assuming you only have one sets of parents-in-law, the possessive would be parents-in-law's, wouldn't it?
Parents is plural. "I stayed at my parents' house." But if I am talking about only one parent, I say, "I stayed at my parent's house."
TEd
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#41880
09/17/2001 5:31 PM
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misoneism, meaning hatred of innovation
and would a moderate degree of distate for inovation be mesomisoneism?
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#41881
09/18/2001 5:19 AM
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Thanks TEd and Flatlander, that's what I thought but it just didn't look right. The context by the way was "She knows her parents-in-law's birthdays."
Bingley
Bingley
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#41882
09/18/2001 5:41 AM
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Still doesn't look right, Bingley. Parents-in-law shouldn't be allowed to own anything! 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#41883
09/18/2001 10:34 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 771
old hand
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old hand
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"She knows her parents-in-law's birthdays."I'm with CK - it still doesn't look right. This sounds like a case for Prepositional Phrase!! More powerful than an apostrophe! Sexier than a dangling participle! Able to be strung together so that a sentence is right next door to incomprehensible! [coronet flourish] It's some words... it's inane! It's Prepositional Phrase!"She knows the birthdays of her parents-in-law."My work here is done.
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#41884
09/18/2001 11:31 AM
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[coronet flourish] You've been crowned, f-babe?  I still say it should be parents-in-laws'. Bingley, since you are unsure (somebody fan me, quick), the only person whose uncited word I will take is Nicholas'.
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#41885
09/18/2001 12:10 PM
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it ... doesn't look right.
Well, the prepositional phrase doesn't *sound right. So I guess it depends on whether you're going to say it or write it. If you really must write down what someone said, you're on your own.
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#41886
09/19/2001 2:33 AM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289
veteran
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veteran
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WARNING: DIVERGENCE FROM THE MAIN SUBJECT
This discussion of relations brings to mind something interesting which I encounted the other day. Chinese has two different words for "sister-in-law"; one for "wife's older sister" and a different word for "wife's younger sister". Although the article I read didn't say so, I would presume the same applies to brothers-in-law. I am also aware that in a good many languages there are different words for "aunt/uncle on the mother's side" and "aunt/uncle on the father's side" and that there are, even in English, different words for different kinds of cousins. (Cousin-german comes to mind.)
Does this indicate that we English speakers are not as concerned with the niceties of family relationships as other people who need such terms because the intricacies of the family are important? I would imagine that the two different words in Chinese reflect that culture's old-time acknowledgement of rank and position in families as well as in other relationships.
Do any of you have some more instances to share and/or comment on?
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#41887
09/19/2001 6:32 AM
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Some Indonesian relationship terms:
kakak older sibling
adik younger sibling
Even twins get divided into kakak and adik.
Saudara male relative in the same generation (includes brothers and male cousins)
Saudari female relative in the same generation (includes sisters and female cousins)
Also a term of address used to promote solidarity; not as common as adik and kakak for actual relatives.
bapak and ayah father. I think ayah implies a closer less formal relationship.
ibu mother
bapak and ibu are also used as terms of address, Mr. and Ms.; also seorang bapak a man seorang ibu a woman
orang tua parents (literally old people: in slang abbreviated to ortu)
kakek grandfather
nenek grandmother
also used to mean old man or old woman (also note: nenek moyang the ancestors)
anak child
putra son putri daughter (much less commonly used than anak)
ipar brother or sister in law
menantu son or daugher in law
mertua parent in law
besan son or daughter in law's parent
om or paman uncle (om is also used as a friendly term of address to a man of one's parents' generation)
tante or bibi (again tante is also used as friendly term of address to a woman of one's parents' generation)
keponakan nephew or niece (but unless you were being very precise you would probably call them anak)
sepupu cousin (again you would probably call them kakak or adik)
Bingley
Bingley
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#41888
09/19/2001 2:00 PM
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RE:
Saudara male relative in the same generation (includes brothers and male cousins)
Saudari female relative in the same generation (includes sisters and female cousins)
and is there a term for cousin not in the same gereration?
my father's family is 'fractured'-- he was born when his mother was in her 50's, and she was the youngest in her family, so my grandmother was born when her mother (my greatgrand mother) was 48.
the result, many of my father's first cousins were 40+years older than he was. so i have many relatives who are second cousins, once removed.. (they are my age, but i belong with their parent's generation, who are my second cousins.)
it is confusing.. most of us didn't understand how it worked till we were adults.. and it caused some problems, since my mother insisted on no "fake" aunts. So some of my cousins (all with a comman grandmother,) were shocked to her me call their grandmother, Annie.. but she was my first cousin, once removed!
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#41889
09/19/2001 5:57 PM
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Jackie harrumphs®: I still say it should be parents-in-laws'. Bingley, since you are unsure... the only person whose uncited word I will take is Nicholas'.
And since Nicholas's [sic] word isn't here, I'll leap into the breach: "in-law" is a descriptive, and in English we don't pluralize adjectives. So I go with "parents'-in-law." For analogies, look at "attorneys-general" and "passers-by."
Having said that, I agree the construction is awkward and should be proscribed post-haste.
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#41890
09/19/2001 6:05 PM
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Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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and mesomezzomisoneism a tepid dislike for the husky caberet chanteuse? (fr.?)
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#41891
09/19/2001 6:16 PM
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ASp:
In speaking the sentence, which would you say:
1. I was at my mother's-in-law house.
2. I was at my mother-in-law's house.
I would always use the second one, never the first. Hmmm. We could recast it. Peggy was at her mom's house. I went along. Or: Peggy wasn't at her mom's house, but I was. (Now, Mrs. Robinson, would you please put that back on!)
TdE
Terrorism delenda est
TEd
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#41892
09/19/2001 6:39 PM
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I'll take Door Number 2, TEd. So much for grammar. Thanks for the aural outpoint.
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#41893
09/19/2001 9:30 PM
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See if this makes sense (and no finger pointing and guffawing if it doesn't 'cause I never claimed to be resident expert, so there)
Can't the whole construction 'mother-in-law' be a noun? The term names one particular person. Without the 'in-law' you are talking about a completely different entity.
I see it the same way I see the term highrise. High is a descriptive but having been joined to rise becomes part of a noun. True the hyphen has been removed but isn't that just a matter of time.
Thus Mother-in-law's house would fit the bill.
Oh wait, I just thougth of the plural. We'd say Mothers-in-law wouldn't we? Ah heck. Colour me clueless again.
I'll stick to "belle-mère / belles-mères". This is the first time I can say it is so much clearer in French.
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#41894
09/19/2001 10:43 PM
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Actually, I agree with you, Bel. Sorry, Jo, but while the construction of "mother-in-law" is a noun modified by an adjective, the whole shebang is one word albeit with two hyphens, and stands on its own as a noun. Ergo, it has to be mother-in-law's. [Afterthought] Oh shit, I'm in the same country as her now. Why did I do it? Just how far is it from Wellingborough to Edinburgh anyway? I think I'll go and get lost in London tomorrow ... 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#41895
09/20/2001 12:54 AM
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"Okay, let me try this again," she mumbles.
In Spanish:
Cuñado=brother of your spouse
Cuñada=sister of your spouse
Pay attention, this is where it gets tricky-
Concuño=husband of your spouse's sister
Concuña=wife of your spouse's brother
Spanish also has names for the relationship between the parents and the godparents of a child.
Comadre=godmother of your child or mother of your godchild
Compadre=godfather of your child or father of your godchild
¡TA-DA! I have finally taken the time to get the tildes, accents, and punctuations mastered! It's a Wahoo moment.
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#41896
09/20/2001 1:39 AM
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SWMBO and MILWMBO - poor, poor CapK 
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#41897
09/20/2001 4:11 AM
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In reply to:
and is there a term for cousin not in the same gereration?
my father's family is 'fractured'
I think saudara/i would be used for people who are more or less your own age, and for much older cousins you would use om or tante, but that's just a feeling. It's as much a question of etiquette as language and quite possibly varies from ethnic group to ethnic group.
Bingley
Bingley
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#41898
09/20/2001 5:49 AM
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SWMBO and MILWMBO - poor, poor CapK
Thanks Bel. I just feel so - endangered! [running and hiding -e]
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#41899
09/20/2001 12:25 PM
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parents'-in-law for the the whole bunch of in-laws on either side. Writing of course, kinda awkward to say "parentses!"
So why not "all the in-laws" and skip parents?
Or is that too easy?
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#41900
09/20/2001 12:41 PM
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what am I missing here, guys? We have a description (a noun phrase) with the form ~in-law, with the stem varied by wether it is singular or plural. But in both cases the possessive suffix is surely 's. Or is that all much too simple?
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#41901
09/20/2001 2:02 PM
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Well somewhere in all the posts up there you will see where we ran into a conundrum Mav. You say "my mother-in-law's house in nice" because the whole term 'mother-in-law' is the noun BUT If mother-in-law is really a noun then why isn't it mother-in-laws (instead of mothers-in-law) when referring to the mom on both sides of the family. And is it mothers-in-law's houses or mother-in-laws' houses. And when you refer to both parents on both sides it becomes an unweildy mouthful (leave that one alone dear - people are sensitive these days and after that whole Bingley size of fig-leaf debacle, well, nuff said)
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#41902
09/20/2001 2:10 PM
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why isn't it mother-in-laws...yeahbut® that's exactly what I do say. One MIL, 2 MILs, and even with the benefits of modern marriage 3 or more MILs imho, Mothers-in-law is pedantic and tastes wrong. No problemo!
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#41903
09/20/2001 2:14 PM
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and what also occurs to me, reading this again, is that it is partly a question as mentioned above of the compaction effect over time: whilst your proposal woud have been fine in the days when we were first talking about 'mother' qualified by legal status, I would argue we now universally talk about muthrinlaw - it's in effect one word.
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#41904
09/20/2001 3:44 PM
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addict
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Cuñado=brother of your spouse
Cuñada=sister of your spouse
Pay attention, this is where it gets tricky-
Concuño=husband of your spouse's sister
Concuña=wife of your spouse's brother
OK, consuelo, but what about the spouse of your brother/sister? I've always found it odd that English doesn't have a seperate word for that relationship.
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#41905
09/20/2001 5:21 PM
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We do Flatlander. The spouse of your brother is your sister-in-law, and the spouse of your sister is your brother-in-law.
Were you, perhaps, talking about the siblings of your brother(or sister)-in-law? There is no 'one' word to describe these people, well, "strangers" if you really don't know them.
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#41906
09/20/2001 6:41 PM
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addict
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I asked, OK... but what about the spouse of your brother/sister?
and belM noted, The spouse of your brother is your sister-in-law, and the spouse of your sister is your brother-in-law.
I should have been clearer. I meant that it seems strange to me that both the brother of your spouse and the spouse of your brother are given the same title. I like how there is a name for the spouse of your spouse's sibling -- I have some very good relationships with my concuño/as (plurals, consuelo?) -- and I was wondering if there was a difference between the names of the different relationships I mentioned above.
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#41907
09/20/2001 7:36 PM
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#41908
09/20/2001 7:48 PM
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...how many solicitors-general, attorneys-general, and even Governors-general I must report your infraction to?
You must have handsful of them.
Note: the -s- plural marker infix!
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#41909
09/20/2001 8:18 PM
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>You say "my mother-in-law's house in nice" because the whole term 'mother-in-law' is the noun BUT If mother-in-law is really a noun then why isn't it mother-in-laws (instead of mothers-in-law) when referring to the mom on both sides of the family. And is it mothers-in-law's houses or mother-in-laws' houses.
Moot point. If you have more than one mother-in-law you have a LOT more to worry about than where to put a little old apostrophe or -s for pluralization.
It was bigamy to bring that up!
TEd
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#41910
09/20/2001 11:26 PM
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The spouse of your brother or sister still falls under the same category as the brother or sister of your spouse. Sorry, that combination escaped me. I think it must have run under the desk while I was learning to make the tilde  .
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#41911
09/20/2001 11:28 PM
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In my family they are known as out-laws[tee-hee emoticon]
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#41912
09/21/2001 4:38 AM
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In reply to:
after that whole Bingley size of fig-leaf debacle, well, nuff said
Have I missed something? Been taken over by aliens? I don't remember mentioning any figging leaves.
Bingley
Bingley
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#41913
09/21/2001 4:44 AM
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While we're on the subject when did -in-law come to refer your spouse's relatives, anyway? In Jane Austen's time mother-in-law meant stepmother, and brothers- and sisters-in-law were just called brother and sister.
Bingley
Bingley
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#41914
09/21/2001 5:14 AM
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Well, Bingley old chappie, we're all much, much younger than you. We, unlike you, weren't around during the Regency period. We all defer to your greater longevity!
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#41915
09/21/2001 5:29 AM
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That's the problem with cryogenics. One misses out on developments which occurred between the two periods in one's life.
Bingley
Bingley
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