family meaning

Noun: family  famulee

1. A social unit living together
   "he moved his family to Virginia"
   - household, house, home, ménage 
2. Primary social group; parents and children
   "he wanted to have a good job before starting a family"
   - family unit 
3. A collection of things sharing a common attribute
   - class, category 
4. People descended from a common ancestor
   "his family has lived in Massachusetts since the Mayflower"
   - family line, folk, kinfolk, kinsfolk, sept, phratry 
5. A person having kinship with another or others
   "he's family"
   - kin, kinsperson 
6. (biology) a taxonomic group containing one or more genera
   "sharks belong to the fish family" 
7. A loose affiliation of gangsters in charge of organized criminal activities
   - syndicate, crime syndicate, mob 
8. An association of people who share common beliefs or activities
   "the message was addressed not just to employees but to every member of the company family"
   - fellowship

Derived forms: families

See also: familial

Type of: accumulation, aggregation, ancestry, assemblage, association, blood, blood line, bloodline, clan, collection, descent, flesh and blood, gangdom, gangland, kin, kin group, kindred, kinship group, line, line of descent, lineage, organised crime [Brit], organized crime, origin, parentage, pedigree, relation, relative, social unit, stemma, stock, taxon, taxonomic category, taxonomic group, tribe, unit

Part of: order

Encyclopedia: Family Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America

[Architecture]

In urban planning, one or more persons occupying a single living unit.

[Law]
n. A group of people connected by a close relationship. For legal purposes a family is usually limited to relationships by blood, marriage, or adoption, although sometimes (e.g. for social security purposes) statute expressly includes other people, such as common-law wives (see COMMON-LAW MARRIAGE). The courts have interpreted the word "family" to include unmarried couples living as husband and wife in permanent and stable relationships. In the past, gay couples have always been excluded from the definition. However, in a recent case the court interpreted the word "family" in the Rent Act 1977to include the gay partner of a deceased tenant.

[Medicine]
A social group consisting of parents or parent substitutes and children. n pl -lies
1 : the basic unit in society traditionally consisting of two parents rearing their own or adopted children; also : any of various social units differing from but regarded as equivalent to the traditional family ‹a single-parent family›
2 : a group of related plants or animals forming a category ranking above a genus and below an order and usu. comprising several to many genera — family adj

• in the family:    [American idiom]re ...
• the bloggs family:    [Computer]An imagi ...
• (all) in the family:    [American slang]re ...

Examples

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1. her family had of late exceedingly fluctuated.
2. you can bet the family jewels on it.
3. don't be nervous, just the immediate family.
4. he was adopted into a respectable family.
5. every family in our village has grain to spare.