I take my duties as an aunt very seriously. Ever since I became a massi a year ago, I’ve started reflecting more and more on the important role that my aunts and aunties (the female family friends and mothers of friends) played in my life, both when I was a kid and in many cases, now. 
So, I’m not exaggerating when I say that one of my life goals is to be the best massi ever. I can’t help it that I want to be adored and worshiped by my nephew in the same way that I adored and worshiped my aunts (the sisters of my mom and dad who I called tata-French for aunt—or simply by their first names, as in Dipika or Poupee) and aunties (I can never forget the glamorous Auntie Veena in Ghana who baked cheese sticks for our picnic at the Tesano Sports Club in Accra when I was 10) throughout my childhood.
Which is why when I first heard about the UK bestselling tribute to the institution of aunty-dom, The Complete Book of Aunts, by Rupert Christiansen with Beth Brophy, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it. It even includes “ten golden rules for aunts”! From the book jacket:
Of all our blood relations, an aunt offers the most potential for uncomplicated friendship. THE COMPLETE BOOK OF AUNTS is an entertaining and touching exploration of aunts in all their guises and varieties, culled from real-life, literary and historical sources.
The book was inspired by a kid’s question to the author: “Why are there aunts?” In response, Christiansen takes a thorough look at the etymology of the word aunt, the many words for it that exist in world languages, and great aunts in (mostly Victorian) literature. He also highlights various aunt types: Bargain Aunts, Mothering Aunts, Damned Bad Aunts, X-Rated Aunts, and Honorary Aunties (think of all the older desi ladies you call ‘auntie’).
We’ve all had most of these varieties of aunts in my life (perhaps not the X-Rated Aunt!). And, I definitely know a little something about mothering aunts. From the ages of 6-11, I lived in Pune with my grandmother and my own massi (the fact that I called her by her nickname Poupee, rather than using a title of respect indicates not a lack of respect but just our level of intimacy), while my mom shuttled back and forth between my father who could not leave the politically tumultuous Ghana and her children, who were getting a “good education” in a relatively stable India. My aunt Poupee was, in effect, my surrogate mother. Throughout my childhood, I saw my mom and her as different sides of the coin of grace, protection, discipline, affection, and unconditional love.
While reading The Complete Book of Aunts though, I was also especially interested in the “Honorary Auntie.” (How many of us when we meet an older desi woman—even if it’s someone working at a shop—want to call her ‘auntie’?)
“The auntie is a particularly potent figure in India, crossing several complex linguistic and cultural domains. Probal Dasgupta’s study The Otherness of English: India’s Auntie Tongue (1993) explores the auntie as “a significant fact in the domain of English usage,” quoting Kamal K. Sridhar’s view that she “functions as a marker of Western sophistication among the upwardly mobile middle classes in urban and semi-urban India.” In Indian English, it emerges, “middle and upper middle class children who got to English-medium schools address their friends’ mothers as Auntie.” This cannot be new: In The Raj Quartet, Paul Scott’s novels about the British withdrawal from India in the 1940s, the ingenuous Daphne Manners shyly asks whether she can call Lady Chatterjee auntie.”
I’m not so sure that only kids who attend English-medium schools used the word “auntie.” I’ve had salespeople and hawkers call me “auntie” when trying to draw my attention to their wares. And, of course, street kids who knock on the windows of a car or hang out by the autorickshaw asking for a rupee or two — they’ve called me “auntie” too …
At wikipedia, the entry on Indian English had this to say about the use of the word auntie:
Use of the English words ‘uncle’ and ‘aunty’ as suffixes when addressing people such as distant relatives, neighbours, acquaintances, even total strangers (like shopkeepers) who are significantly older than oneself. E.g., “Hello, Swathi aunty!” In fact, in Indian culture, children or teenagers addressing their friend’s parents as Mr Patel or Mrs Patel (etc.) is considered unacceptable, perhaps even offensive—a substitution of Sir/Ma’am is also not suitable except for teachers. On the contrary, if a person is really one’s uncle or aunt, he/she will usually not be addressed as “uncle”/”auntie”, but with the name of the relation in the vernacular Indian language, even while conversing in English. For example, if a woman is one’s mother’s sister, she would not be addressed (by a Hindi speaker) as “auntie” but as Mausi (Hindi: मौसी). It is interesting to observe that calling one’s friends’ parents auntie and uncle was also very common in Great Britain in the 1960s and 70s but is much rarer today.
I want to know: What are your aunty or auntie memories? Are there any great aunts and aunties you know of in Indian folktales, mythology, contemporary literature, art, and movies (yes, I mean Bollywood too!)? Me thinks it’s time to pay tribute to the desi aunt and auntie.
