Abstract
Abstract This paper reports a case study that discusses issues related to the reconstruction of kinship terminology in Proto-Tupi, based on previous work by Araújo and Storto (2002) on the Arikém and Juruna subfamilies. It also presents the remaining kin terminology of the Karitiana language (Arikém branch or subfamily) which was not discussed in the case study. Comparing Karitiana (Landin, 1989) and Juruna (Lima, 1995) kin terminology, Araújo and Storto (2002) have shown that some cognates can be found in the two languages and proposed that they reconstruct in Proto-Tupi. These authors claim that these reconstructed items indicate the following hypotheses: (1) the speakers of Proto-Tupi (4500 BP) had a Dravidian kinship system; (2) the speakers of Proto-Tupi had a kinship and naming system in which ego was equated with the paternal grandparent of the same sex as ego. Besides the 11 cognates discussed by Araújo and Storto (2002), we discuss the remaining 19 kin terms that form the Karitiana kinship system according to Landin (1989).
Highlights
INTRODUCTIONWomen probably address aunts who are their mother’s younger sisters as ti’et, which consists of the lexical items for ‘mother’ and ‘child’ (woman speaking) and can be translated as ‘mother’s child’ because these women’s mothers may have raised their younger sisters as if they were their own children
The reciprocal term, which grandparents use to address the grandchildren who bear their names, is ongot, and may have derived historically from an archaic Proto-Arikém form of 1st person õn and the adjective got (‘young’), literally ‘me young’ or ‘I as a youth.’. This hypothetical etymology may not work in other Tupian families, but this cognate clearly exists in both Juruna and Arikém as it exists in Mondé and Aweti, suggesting that the special status of a grandparent who is a namegiver exists elsewhere
The same author points out that the Karitiana combine the Dravidian system with avunculate, which we found to be correct in our own fieldwork
Summary
Women probably address aunts who are their mother’s younger sisters as ti’et, which consists of the lexical items for ‘mother’ and ‘child’ (woman speaking) and can be translated as ‘mother’s child’ because these women’s mothers may have raised their younger sisters as if they were their own children Proof of this hypothesis is that the word ‘dog’ in Karitiana, ombaky by-’et-na [jaguar causative-child-adjectivizer] involves the term ’et in its formation and is derived from ‘jaguar,’ meaning ‘domesticated/raised jaguar,’ suggesting that ’et literally means ‘raised.’. Younger siblings of the same sex are always derived with the root iza, and elder siblings of the same sex are derived using the root i’uraha
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