Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
blood kinship

blood kinship

6.3
A family link between people who are related by birth, not by marriage or adoption
  • noun
  • /blʌd ˈkɪnʃɪp/
translation icon : parentesco de sangre
  • The law recognizes blood kinship when determining inheritance rights.

Examples

  • He felt a strong sense of blood kinship with his cousins despite rarely seeing them.

  • Anthropologists study blood kinship to understand how family groups are structured.

  • Their blood kinship is evident in their shared features.

  • Do you believe in blood kinship over friendship?

  • The family reunion highlighted the importance of blood kinship as relatives shared stories of their common ancestry.

  • Understanding blood kinship is essential for tracing family history, especially when investigating genetic diseases.

  • In many cultures, blood kinship is valued more highly than relationships formed through marriage or friendship.

Synonyms

consanguinity
vsblood kinship
  • Specialized
1 9.9

A blood relation between people from the same family

is the neutral everyday expression rather than the formal label
cognation
vsblood kinship
  • Specialized
9.9

A blood relationship that shows family by birth

is the general term used outside the anthropology field

Antonyms

non-related
3.8

A person who is not part of the same family

How Close

parent
∞ 1.0
sibling
253 1.0
blood kinship
6.3
cousin
∞ 1.0
ancestor
419 2.4

Surface Forms

blood kinship singular
blood kinships plural

Morphology

blood + kinship

The meaning 'relationship by descent' is directly and transparently built from 'blood' (hereditary lineage) + 'kinship' (family relationship), so a learner who knows both words can infer it refers to biological relations rather than marriage or adoption. This is a straightforward compositional pattern found cross-linguistically (e.g. 'blood relation'), making it readily understandable at B1.

Etymology

Blood kinship comes from the simple picture of people who share the same blood and so belong to the same family idea of kinship. That's why it means 'relation by blood' or 'being related by birth', not by marriage or adoption.