big family
41
1.0
- noun
:
familia numerosa
- First of all, living in a big family enables everyone to help each other more easily.
Like when it's a big family in a house and there's a supply shortage.
- Like when it's a big family in a house and there's a supply shortage.
- The people I do know who have a big family in Russia, they love Putin.
- And you know, it's lower class area, single mum, big family.
- The Muslim population is doing great, big families.
- My mom's one of eight siblings, big family.
- So my mother, Marie, she wanted a big family and she's from Hoboken, NJ, Italian.
- So I just had this dream of having a big family.
- And, you know, but part of starting to fight was that you're from a big family.
- I think it's because growing up in a big family, like you're not always like completely paid attention to.
- Sometimes it surprises me, sometimes it's great, but sometimes like we also just, we have big families.
- I've got four brothers, all older than me and big family, and four sisters, three-year older than me and one is younger than me.
- And Uncle Hubert as one of the oldest boys in the family who wasn't going to be a priest, which which is what happened with two of the boys in the very big family.
- It was usually the late afternoon when that would happen and the smell of food would hit you because things are being prepared upstairs and downstairs for the big family feast.
Examples
-
Tonight there would be a big family dinner in the apartment on Orchard Street.
Fiction book (1992) -
What's amazing is, with such a big family there's always something to celebrate.
-
So I think she found a way to live in a big family and learned, you know, the right ways to get along with people.
-
Do you come from a big family?
-
Frank still feels that way; he came from a big family and wants one of his own.
Fiction book (1993) -
I grew up in a big family and a lot of extended family members.
Blog text (19) -
I absolutely love being from a big family, and I had always planned on having 4-5 children.
Blog text (27) -
Listen, my mom's planning a really big family reunion.
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Halloween turns out to be a big family night on Redlands' Cajon Street.
Blog text (10) -
I love my big family because they are always supportive and full of fun.
Synonyms
48
2.7
A group of related people including parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins
Antonyms
How Big
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a family with a large number of members' is directly and transparently composed from 'big' (large in size/number) + 'family' (relatives). This adjective+noun construction follows a standard compositional pattern common across languages, so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily infer the MWE meaning.
Etymology
The phrase big family comes from the simple image of a family that is big, with a house full of parents, children and other relatives. So big family means 'a family with many members'.