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so, I'm the youngest of 3 sisters (i'm also trans) and I have an identical twin brother. I have also known others with siblings, and since coming to this site (and admittedly, others) I have encountered a curious phenomenon where people refer to their siblings by 'sis', 'sissy' or in male cases 'bro' or 'lil bro' or stuff like this.
I have to admit, it utterly baffles me, because i have NEVER seen this in real life; we always used each other's names and not titles, only using the titles when introducing each other. IE: This is my brother, this is my sister, et cetera but never in casual conversation in lieu of their actual name. It seems very silly and contrived and my knee jerk thought is that it's done by people who haven't had siblings. But this can't be the case, can it?
Am I alone here? Is this a common thing and I'm just the odd one out? Because it seems very strange and odd to me.
Comments
Generational and Regional
I'm from the South and yes, people do call each other by such family appellations. It might be generational, but at least people born in the sixties or earlier do this. In fact, they sometimes become general nicknames: I have a cousin who is known to all of her relatives as "Sisto" which was her one-year-older brother's attempt to say "sister" when she was a baby. Another cousin is called "Bud" which is a countrified version of the urban "Bro"; both are derived from brother. One of the odder versions of that is to hear some guy called "Bra". :)
I have an ancestor who was generally known to all and sundry as "Son" Milton. He had five older sisters; they lived on a mountaintop in Tennessee (seriously) and it wasn't necessary for his parents to call him by his given name since he was the only son living there. Everyone else called him "Son", too, including his sisters. He was thirty years old and married with three sons of his own before his actual name finally appeared in a census record. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
I've always ......
I've always called my brother either "lil bruv" or just "bruv" if I do use his name its shortened to "Stu"
Sammi
names
being a child of the 40s and 50s in texas, we nearly ways called people by both birth names. example, james Robert or such. I never called my brother bro or any other name except his full name. I do have a step sister who dislikes her names, so we do call her sissy.
robert
Rural east texas, in the 70's
Rural east texas, in the 70's and 80's, I went to school with a guy who everyone called 'Bubba', and I've known at least one 'Sonny'. A customer, who is from Arkansas - they call their youngest son 'Bud'. That's not his name, of course.
I'll get a life when it's proven and substantiated to be better than what I'm currently experiencing.
Not contrived, at least not now, maybe when it first started
I have always called my brother, bro or brother in third party references. sis/sister for my younger sister. maybe in a more upscale social upbringing? or higher level education parents? or as others have said, maybe just regional/generational.
Teresa L.
bubba
my many siblings call me bubba to my dismay
ed
ed
it isn't the way we did it either.
my 2 sisters were always their names, unless we were squabbling of course, my younger brother had a nickname that ended when he introduced himself to dad's boss with the nickname. ( retard if you really want to know )
no-one in my extensive family ever used sis, sissy, bro, or cuz it was always full first names introducing, then shortened version in use where commonly used ( Sue for Susan, Jase for Jason, John for Johnathon )
( with my mom being 8th of 9 children and the average on her side of the family being 4 for my generation extensive is the only way to put it, family reunions were in excess of 200 people covering 5 generations )
Stupidity is a capital offense. A summary not indictable.
Sis and Bro
My sister and I, both from California and born in the 1940's, always used our names when speaking to each other, as did our parents. No nicknames at all, not even shortened versions of our names. My wife is one of three sisters, and they do use shortened versions of their names, but no other nicknames.
Not as children
I don't really recall my sister and I using "sis" and "bro" (of course later that became "sis" too...) as kids, but then as children we were so focused on stiff formality and proper usage of both language and names that even slang and contractions were rare. Circumstances kept us from being close then anyway.
As adults it did become our intimate form of address and used socially in the context of close friends or family.
Southern culture seems to lean toward nicknames in lieu of formal names even in public life and politics and this tendency seems to be particularly pronounced here in SC. "Bubba" is not just a nickname, it can be applied to almost any male person of any stature. I suppose a bit further north that might turn to "Bub" or Bud".
We being urban kids, were
We being urban kids, were called nicknames that stuck for years. I got saddled with "ham" because of my weight and slowness, my brother was called "weasel" for his ability to manipulate and get out of trouble, my eldest sister got "big foot" because of her height and clumsiness, my other sister got called "glicka" because she was tall and skinny.
We never called one another our real names unless talking with our aunt or uncle who had her own nicknames for us.
I'm told STFU more times in a day than most people get told in a lifetime
sis, bro, etc
I was born in NJ and spent most of my life there, we never called each other 'bro' nor did we call our one sister 'sis'. I never heard anyone do that at all. I've only seen this in the movies and on tv.
I was an Air Force brat,
my brother was Jimmy growing up.
It may have something to do with my Mom and Dad both having 11 or more siblings. Too many brothers, too many sisters.
Apparently not...
Though I have to say I have quite a different experience myself. I was born in '85, suburban NW Ohio, solidly middle class, and my family would sometimes use given names, sometimes specific nicknames, and sometimes we'd just refer to each other by our familial relationship to the one we're addressing. There was no real pattern to it either, it was pretty much whatever whoever was talking felt like at the time. The only exception were my parents referring to any of us kids by our full names. Whenever that happened, we knew we were in some major trouble.
Abigail Drew.
Perhaps regional, but...
I grew up in Oregon and have a cousin whom the whole family, and even some of the neighbor kids, called Sissy or Sis. It was just her name. I never knew her name until she started high school and developed an interest in boys and informed everyone that her name was Lynn. I guess she didn't want her love interest to pick up on the nickname.
However my brother, who was raised through his formative years in Kansas, when calling me on the phone greets me with "Hello Brother." But when we are conversing in person he uses my given name or a derivative of the same.
In my neck of the woods, the term "Bro" is reserved for homeboys.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Not in my family
It was too big. Some use diminutives, but always names. I did go to school with a girl that went by Sissy, her brother couldn't pronounce her name when they were little, so he called her Sissy. When I met them in Jr. High, everyone called her Sissy. I knew others where siblings would occasionally use Sis or Bro, but that was usually when there no other sister or brother to cause confusion.
'Sis' yes, but never 'Bro'
MY older sister and I share the same birthday, only 3 years apart! And grew up more like twins at times, even more so now we are older. I have sometimes caller her sis, but we mostly do not use any names at all. Here in the UK I have never heard anyone use 'bro'. I think that is a very American saying.