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It hit me when I was editing this question which had the tag. I wasn't sure if 「娘」 is considered a pronoun in Japanese. Looking for relevant examples of kinship terminology in English, I think all the comparable terms I can think of are not categorized as pronouns. Wikipedia's pronoun page has this claim:

In English, kin terms like "mother," "uncle," "cousin" are a distinct word class from pronouns

This appears corroborated by dictionaries.

Wikipedia's Japanese pronouns page doesn't list such terms. There's no 母さん, 父上, 爺ちゃん, お姉ちゃん, or 兄貴. Another reference: 代名詞. So are they not pronouns? Why?

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  • I think Mother, Father, Grandpa, Sister, Brother... etc etc, isn't pronouns in English as well. At least I couldn't find them here.
    – Skye-AT
    Oct 19, 2021 at 1:29
  • @Skye-AT Yes, I know, and dictionaries agree. Still I'd like to ask from a Japanese grammar point of view. After all, 品詞 in Japanese works quite differently from parts of speech in English.
    – Eddie Kal
    Oct 19, 2021 at 1:31
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    @EddieKal - They are only a few of a number of possible ways to reference a third person and are not much different from あいつ, 奴, あの人, あのお方, etc. (except they could sound more artificial). Often times it’s more natural to repeatedly reference them by their names. Substitution with pronouns in European languages, such as he, she, etc. in English, is more automatic and done on the grammatical level.
    – aguijonazo
    Oct 19, 2021 at 3:47
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    In Japanese, it is more the speaker’s choice which is influenced by various factors, not least their relationships with the people referenced. Addressing someone as 娘 is also the speaker’s choice which may or may not be permitted depending on those factors. Calling all of them pronouns, or 代名詞 for that matter, seems strange to me.
    – aguijonazo
    Oct 19, 2021 at 3:47
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    Collins uses a term 'vocative nouns'. I don't know if this is widely accepted.
    – sundowner
    Oct 19, 2021 at 6:46

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