Description:

The term 'ife' is almost excludively used as a noun and means offspring, son or daughter. It can translate the English word 'child', but only in the sense of being someone's offspring, it refers to the relationship, not the life stage. The word 'pocuk', or prepubescent child, might be used to mean son or daughter idiomatically, but ife is the most commonly used word.

'Ife' is often used in intrinsically gendered variants as life and cejífe for daughter and son, respectively.

The word for grandchild is derived by compounding ife with sinku, little, to form 'sinkuife'. The form 'ifepe' means the same thing but sounds more informal or cutesy. If a gendered form is desired, the speaked can either use a gender modifier, or apply the gender prefix directly to the 'ife' head of the compound.

Further degrees of great granschildren are dericed by compounding ordinal numbers to the front of the compound for the degree of separation. So 'kawassinkuife' using 'kawas', 'second', is 'great grandchild'.

Ife is also commonly used as a form of social address, as a head term when addressing others who are not necessarily related. 'Ife' is used much like 'itti', 'younger sibling', to politely address a social inferior, such as a server in a customer service situation. 'Ife' will often be chosen over 'itti' if the addressee is much younger than the addresser.