The English Oracle

Is there a word meaning "my child's spouse's parents"?

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Chapters
00:00 Is There A Word Meaning &Quot;My Child'S Spouse'S Parents&Quot;?
00:22 Accepted Answer Score 15
01:36 Answer 2 Score 6
02:27 Answer 3 Score 5
03:04 Answer 4 Score 3
03:17 Answer 5 Score 0
03:31 Thank you

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Full question
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Tags
#wordchoice #singlewordrequests #vocabulary #kinshipterms

#avk47



ACCEPTED ANSWER

Score 15


Wiktionary attests a specific term for the relationship you describe: co-parents-in-law. However, it recommends simply using in-law in conversation:

Rare in conversation, the generic “in-laws” is generally used, with context left to disambiguate. Once grandchildren are born, the term co-grandparents may be used if the focus is on the relationship through the grandchildren rather than though the married couple.

While we most often use in-law to refer to the blood relatives of your own spouse, or sometimes the spouses of your blood relatives, you can also use it for other relatives by marriage. For example, a brother-in-law is your spouse’s brother or your sibling’s husband, and your in-laws are your spouse’s family, but an in-law could be a more distant relation, in context.

If that's unsatisfactory, you can simply say my daughter’s in-laws or my son-in-law’s parents. Indeed, that may be the simplest and clearest way to introduce them.

On a related note: Relationship through marriage is called affinity, as opposed to consanguinuity for blood relations. You can call a relative by marriage affinal kin, although I doubt it’d be understood by anyone but a genealogist or a practitioner of family law.




ANSWER 2

Score 5


While not English, there is a term from Yiddish that is injected into sentences otherwise in English by many, especially in communities with significant Jewish populations - machatunim (or mechatunim, it being a transliteration with a good deal of regional dialectic diversity).

There is no English word for the Yiddish machatunim; in Spanish it is consuegros and means "co-in-laws." The parents of the people my children have married are my machatunim.

Machatunim is actually derived from Hebrew. It's plural, referring to both in-laws.




ANSWER 3

Score 3


I would say your son's/daughter's father-in-law/mother-in-law.




ANSWER 4

Score 0


Knowing already the word in Spanish and Yiddish, I've suggested cross-laws for English. Maybe if everyone on ELU adopts it…