Picture this: You’re a single woman in your early forties who
has taken a liking to a handsome twenty-something guy who lives in your apartment building. Hey, if it works for Demi, why not you? So you gather the courage and leave a box of samosas at his door, with a note that says, “Just made a batch and thought you might like a few.”
An hour later, there’s a knock at your door. He’s standing there in shorts and a tank top, looking as studly as ever. “The samosas were great,” he says. “Thank you for thinking of me, Aunty.”
Well, that scenario probably never happened to Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan, but she’s nevertheless peeved about being called “aunty” by people she barely knows, as she states in this month’s Khabar (her piece originally appeared in India Currents, linked below).
Today, the title “aunty†is so overused and misused that it has lost its position and meaning. Indian-American children are taught that every adult female is a potential aunty; many carry this presumption to the conclusion that any adult female older than them can be an aunty. I’m not referring to school children here, but to those I see as adults, the lipsticked and bearded variety, who ought to know better. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t have a problem with terms like ammayi, or cheriamma, or edathi, all specific Malayalam words that acknowledge individuals who are close family members and deserve rightful respect in the family’s pecking order. There are equivalent terms in every Indian language: terms like maami, mausi, and didi that all validate close family connections. But amongst English-speaking Indian Americans, the frequent use of “aunty†or “uncle†is more often an example of lazy speech, or a desire to bump the individual in question into the category of doddering older-other, than it is a thoughtful moniker of respect. Therein lies the problem. [Link]
Srinivasan, Director of Development at SVILC, Santa Clara County’s Independent Living Center (and aunty to Shashi Tharoor’s sons), notes the importance of aunties in our culture — “Children have always needed aunties: women who were caring and courageous enough to share in the act of mothering” — and offers some guidelines on using the term “aunty”:
If I have not known you when you were a child, and been a part of your life as you learnt and grew—I am not your aunty.
If you are an adult with or without furrows on your temples, and our paths have never crossed before—I am not your aunty.
If your children are younger than mine, or you are the same age as my grown children, but I am meeting you for the first time—I am not your aunty.
And if you’re just not sure what to call someone? Ask; don’t assume. [Link]
I’ve been called “uncle” a few times and not just by my nephew and nieces, so I’d like to offer some guidelines too. Whatever your age, you may use the term “uncle,” as long as you use it in sentences like these:
“Sure, Uncle, I’ll babysit your children every Friday night.”
“May I mow your lawn for you, Uncle?”
“To my Uncle Melvin, I leave all my worldly possessions …”
And, of course:
- “Here are some samosas I made for you, Uncle.”
sounds like ur going to keep my mouth busy anyway, so its all moot
Most people turn into patients outside hospitals. That is the reason most doctors feel entitled to use their title in the community. I used the Dr. title freely for a few years after graduation but stopped after being harassed by everyone from auto drivers to neighbourhood uncles seeking free medical advice for their dodgy knees, windy bottoms and other such piles of problems. Nowadays, when with the lay public, I pretend to be a middle school biology teacher. Unless I want to get some job done by providing free medical advice on their piles of problems.
The term Aunty in Bombay also meant those who ran bootleg liquor shops during prohibition that Morarjee Desai had introduced. They were mostly around the Colaba, Bandra areas of Bombay.
Thanks, Khoofia! Those lines are an excellent start.
I want to add:
You might be an aunty if you….
Inquire from other aunties about their offsprings’ G.P.As and SAT scores.
Ask some single Desi lad/lass why they are still single or if they have plans for marriage…
Ask a newly wed Desi gal if she’s gaining weight. (Seriously, this happened to me 17 years ago. At first I thought it was a rude remark about my appearance and I was far from being a roly -poly then. I later learned it was a euphemistic way to ask are you expecting. As for my response, I just muttered a friendly no, but my brain was very confused and upset at the time. Although hopefully with a new generation of aunties these sorts of questions will become more rare.)
You can really go to town with this.
I forgot this:
You might be an Aunty if you keep loading up youngsters’ plates with food and say that you are losing weight and here is the solution to your “problem”. (Even if you are ready to barf, I remember aunties and even a rare uncle piling on the food in my plate at Indian pow-wows. It annoyed the heck out of me at the time, but again I later learned that is the Indian way to show hospitality. Or maybe a way to get rid of some bad food without wasting it.)
In my last post, I meant to say that the Aunty would tell me that I was “losing weight” and getting too skinny. And I definitely was not skinny but not overweight either. The 2nd line in my last post was a bit confusing. Keep in mind I grew up in the 70’s when many Indians considered being plump to be the ideal.
aunty? i’m malayali like author complaining about people calling her “aunty”.
we say “andy”. 😀
An aunty is as an aunty does.
…………aaahhhhh the good ol’ dayz. Wish they’d come back. I’m tired of being called “moti” by people with no sense of manners.
Obviously, Shobha Auntie had to write this article in order meet the Tharoor family’s yearly quota of pointless articles. Next year, keeping with his theme of clothing he disapproves of, Shashi informs us about the evil that has taken ahold of India in the form of Hawaii Chappals and the demise of the curly-toed shoes.
This is a very funny article and particularly applicable since I’m about to become a father in about three months. My sister, who shall remain nameless for hyper obvious reasons, is absolutely horrified at the idea of being called Aunty by her upcoming niece or nephew. I asked her whether it would be better if “auntie” was appended onto her name, like “Puspha Aunty.” This only seemed to make matters worse. I think that my sister is so against the word “auntie” because it usually conjures up unfortunate images: the auntie who was older, the auntie who had rolls of stomach fat cascading liberally from her too-tight sari blouse, the auntie who force-fed you dal as a child when you went over to her house with your parents, the auntie who did the side-head-jiggle at you when you did something questionable, the auntie who would always hug you tightly, almost to the point of suffocation, as you inhaled her exotic and strangely comforting blend of incense and perfume, and the list clearly goes on and on. I have concluded that it is these images that my sister is not yet willing to aspire to as they present a simultaneous and paradoxical challenge: do I confront my past through the acquisition of a awkward moniker or do I make a stand and stop the cycle now?
There’s some hindi song that goes: “Ladki Uncle keheke pukaare/Take it easy policy…”
We’ve never been able to find the song, but it’s been my dad’s favorite line for the past 15 years. (Ever since he started graying) 🙂
.
My 2 cents… your child should call your sister by whatever the term for ‘father’s sister’ is in your native Indian language. That’s WAY better than the soul-less ‘aunty’.
“your native Indian language”
Why do you assume that the poster in Indian? Yes, it’s a small guffaw or hiccup but an error nonetheless. Only another person adding to the “they are all the same” mentality.
Lol! Exactly my vision of an auntie! Interesting however that guys (while not exactly embracing it) seem to adapt easier to eventually being called uncle than gals being called auntie. Maybe it has something to do with the above imagery!
Rob, from my experience, I think you are right. I actually feel proud when my colleagues’ children call me uncle. It reaffirms the maturity and worldly-wiseness that I feel now, compared to the pot headed cocksure whippersnapper that I was a decade ago. All this while retaining the body of a trained athlete. We had the concept of ‘chacha material’ in my circles- the young uncle-type, a corrupting influence and an overgrown tween, someone who, while being a man’s man and good fun all around, you would think twice before nominating as your children’s local guardian. Many felt honoured on being named chacha material. With women, it’s the biological clock thing I guess- the same reason you never ask a woman’s age.
” Nowadays, when with the lay public, I pretend to be a middle school biology teacher.”
I AM a middle school teacher and I get harassed when people find out that I don’t know everything there is to know about everything.
Gee, I don’t know…could it be all the references below that the poster provided???!!!
I asked her whether it would be better if “auntie” was appended onto her name, like “Puspha Aunty.”
the auntie who had rolls of stomach fat cascading liberally from her too-tight sari blouse
the auntie who force-fed you dal
the auntie who did the side-head-jiggle at you
as you inhaled her exotic and strangely comforting blend of incense and perfume, and the list clearly goes on and on.
a simultaneous and paradoxical challenge: do I confront my past through the acquisition of a awkward moniker
How do you get the quotes from other posts on here when you make your own comment?
Great idea! But still the quandary remains for unrelated people. Usually, I ask the person what I should call them. It is a very awkward question, but then I avoid the other-sort of awkwardness: of calling a person Aunty, when they dont like it.
OK Srinivasan aunty… but you better not call me beta either 🙂
i dunno…i feel like if they wanted you to call them something more familial, they would have told you a looooong time ago. brown parents generally don’t have a problem with that. then again, maybe that’s just my experience with my super-aggressive parents, aunties and uncles.
lol, but…but, how is everyone supposed to know how much better my son is than everyone else in the room if nobody knows he has an m.d.?!
Honestly… I loove being called aunty!! I’m 27 and just recently got married and this is a discussion I always used to have between the girls. I look at it as a way to connect to the older generation from the South Asian community. I still cringe when I think about my friends calling my mum by her first name. Just seems slightly cold to me. But my friends call me “aunty” because I used to (and still) make chai and parathas every weekend and have everyone over to watch desi movies. And I try to matchmake for my friends… I can’t help myself!!
Ha! It’s all about owning the title. Ladies should embrace their destinies.
I see the “uncle” title dropping on me soon. I intend to put on 40 pounds and will my hairline to recede before getting rounded Gandhi-specs and walking around the house in a dhoti and complaining about how the younger generation doesn’t respect its elders.
Here’s your answer.
Could it be that someone tells their lover to “call me Aunty” in the throes of passion?
People in East Asia and South-East Asia also use the words “aunty” and “uncle” a lot.
All those who insult nubile damsels with this atrocious term should be branded as ‘Aunty-socials’ and chucked off to a remote corner of ‘Aunty-gua’. Huh!
My partner and I are queer, so how my ‘in-laws’ see me is complicated by that. I never expected them to come to me and ask me to call them their equivalent of “Mom” and “Dad.”
They didn’t ask me to call them “Dr.”, either — that’s their title, that’s how I met them, and that’s what I called them until I took the initiative to change it.
I thought your partner was a man? Now I’m just confused.
Ok, its about time you guys wrote a new post – this is one helluva boring one to be on top one for 3 days.. UGH!!
And now for something completely different (or maybe not that different)…
Actually…an auntie is what an uncle does 😉
Rob, Any chance you’d be willing to post under “Rob2,” as I’ve been posting under rob for some time?
i figured as much by your handle, which is why i suggested your in-laws might have been uncomfortable with you calling them something more familial. clearly they were not ready to accept the relationship you have with their daughter, even after nine years, and i’m not sure if you forcing the aunty/uncle title on them will assist in this process. the fact that your mil reciprocated by signing her email ‘aunty’, though, could very well indicate that i’m wrong.
But really, an aunty is what does an uncle.
To Rob: No problem. I will pick a different handle.
Actually, you don’t know me, my partner, or his parents. So I don’t know how you can say it’s “clear” they aren’t ready to accept my relationship. Our relationship with his parents is not an either/or situation — it’s not as simple they accept us/they don’t accept us — it has changed over time and continues to change. I don’t see myself as “forcing” anything — I tried something out — because I was uncomfortable with the formality of my address to what are basically my in-laws, because I felt that it was not reflective of our actual relationship. I was NOT comfortable calling them by the names a daughter-in-law would use, because they hadn’t invited me to do so and that would have felt like forcing the issue. If his mom was uncomfortable or upset at the “aunty” label, she could have signed her email more formally or told me so, and I would have switched back. She hasn’t done that.
The reason I brought it up on this thread is that for me, the “aunty” label gives me a way to have a respectful title for my partner’s parents that is less than an in-law, but more than a formal title any stranger would call them. (I see it as similar to the address of Ms./Miss/Mr. FirstName in the U.S. South — a respectful title for people of an older generation that are not legally family, but that are closer than formal strangers.) So I’m thankful for the “aunty” and “uncle” label. I feel like it gives me an in-between space that is actually pretty reflective of my position in his family — not publicly acknowledged as a daughter-in-law (we’re not married, after all), but still close, still familial.
My partner is trans. He began transitioning after we’d been partnered for 5 years.
Transitioning from male to female or female to male?
He is a trans man (FTM) — hence, my male pronouns. 🙂
I feel that cases like that are people who were the opposite gender of what they were born in this life, in the last life. Their shukshma sharir (subtle body, etheral body, the mind and ego) is still identifying with their past life as a man or woman, whichever the case may be. So then they take birth this time around in a male or female physical body, but their mind and ego is still largely whatever sex they were in their past life. Hence the dilemna between their current physical body and what they are feeling internally.
Okay, this is a total threadjack, but I actually think the idea of “opposite” sexes does a disservice to the enormous diversity of people’s sex, sexuality, and gender identities. I think humans are much more fluid and full of gray spaces than the two boxes we put folks in. I’m also not so interested in why trans folks are trans — to me, the most important issue is how they’re treated once they get here, not how they got to be who they are.
But — I don’t think this discussion belongs here. Melvin and SM Intern, feel free to delete my comments if they are too much of a threadjack. Future comments will pertain to the ‘aunty’ thread. 🙂
Lizzie, I agree with you about the grey areas. My theory about past life identification is just that – a grey area of sexuality.
Are you hoping that those two cousins of mine in India will read this post and stop calling you ‘uncle’? (“Uncle, how are you, uncle? Can I speak with akka, uncle? Thank you, uncle!”)
It won’t work. I say accept it — I look young; you look ancient.
I remember an automobile in my early thirties in Hyderabad, India. A fat dark “girl ” of about my age, maybe a couple of years younger, rammed her scooter into my car, coming off blindly out of a side lane. While I was already upset already that she hit me, imagine my anger when she calls me “Uncle”. I wish I had the courage to smack her across the face, instead of just letting her go!!
As an Andhra kid in a village environment in the 60s/70s, “aunties” were about the only female population that a young boy like me actually interacted with. They were my heaven-on- earth-dreams come true. Imagine looking up and seeing all these huge bosoms and these women actually teasing you – they obviously interpreted your uneasiness! And some of them actually let you sleep on their laps!!
To this day, Andhra men like the “Sponge-pillow” kind of Aunties in movies!! This is the reason why many of the female character Telugu actresses such as Sudha, Hema and Apoorva playing moms, aunts and so on are as popular as the heroines themselves!
Smacking a girl just because she called you “uncle”? Bit excessive surely.
Duly noted.
Perhaps the above sentence might clue you in on to why you were/are considered an “uncle”.
The use of the words “aunty” and “uncle” to address total strangers is not peculiar to Indian living in America alone. I was brought up in India all my life and was told to call older neighbours, friends of my parents and most people who were at a lot older than me “aunty” or “uncle”. Of course the tables turned on me as well. I was nineteen when a ten year old first came up to me and said “Aunty, that’s my ball there. Could you throw it back here please?” A year later, my sister’s friend was teaching her newborn, “This is Sneha Aunty”.
@Lalita, #62:
You might be referring to Urvasi Urvasi from Humse Hai Muqabla, though if you understand Tamil the same song has much more bitingly hilarious lyrics: compare here.