Etimology
From Middle English sister, suster, from Old English swustor, sweoster, sweostor (“sister, nun”); from Proto-Germanic *swestēr (“sister”), from Proto-Indo-European *swésōr (“sister”). Cognate with Scots sister, syster (“sister”), West Frisian sus, suster (“sister”), Dutch zuster (“sister”), German Schwester (“sister”), Norwegian Bokmål søster (“sister”), Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish syster (“sister”), Icelandic systir (“sister”), Gothic 𐍃𐍅𐌹𐍃𐍄𐌰𐍂 (swistar, “sister”), Latin soror (“sister”), Russian сестра́ (sestrá, “sister”), Lithuanian sesuo (“sister”), Albanian vajzë (“girl, maiden”), Sanskrit स्वसृ (svásṛ, “sister”), Persian خواهر (xâhar, “sister”). In standard English, the form with i is due to contamination with Old Norse systir (“sister”). The plural sistren is from Middle English sistren, a variant plural of sister, suster (“sister”); compare brethren.
noun
sister (plural sisters or (archaic in most senses) sistren)
A daughter of the same parents as another person; a female sibling.
A female member of a religious order; especially one devoted to more active service; (informal) a nun.
Any butterfly in the genus Adelpha, so named for the resemblance of the dark-colored wings to the black habit traditionally worn by nuns.
(British) A senior or supervisory nurse, often in a hospital.
Any woman or girl with whom a bond is felt through the same biological sex, gender or common membership in a community, race, profession, religion, organization, or ism.
(African-American Vernacular, slang, sometimes capitalized) A black woman.
(informal) A form of address to a woman.
A woman, in certain religious, labour or socialist circles; also as a form of address.
(attributively) An entity that has a special or affectionate, non-hierarchical relationship with another.
(computing theory) A node in a data structure that shares its parent with another node.
(usually attributively) Something in the same class.
Examples
Synonym: sis
Antonym: brother
Hypernym: sibling
My sister is always driving me crazy.
Synonym: nun
Coordinate terms: brother, friar, frater
Michelle left behind her bank job and became a sister at the local convent.
Synonym: charge nurse
Connie was very close to her friend Judy and considered her to be her sister.
Sisters are doing it for themselves / Standing on their own two feet
A fly sister rolled in with a suitcase full of hip-hop novels called The Glamorous Life, and an African brother with long dreads wanted to sell them some incense and some fake Jacob watches.
The short “naps” of the average Sister do not sway in the wind as that of a blonde.
And now, social media has made it worse. From Facebook to Twitter, I get all kinds of invitations. Recently a sister inboxed me on Facebook and told me that she knew for a fact that I wanted her and she wanted me.
Synonyms: darling, dear, love, lady, miss, pet
What’s up, sister?
"Listen, sister. I've got a job for you."
Thank you, sister. I would like to thank the sister who just spoke.
Synonyms: affiliate, affiliated
sister publication
sister city
sister projects
sister ships
sister facility
Within the ABCZ clade, Arecanae are sister of a group that includes all of the other taxa, and the latter fall into two major clades.
Karimi and Cheng et al. , among others, on the other hand, assume that specific objects are base-generated at SpecVP, whereas nonspecific objects are sister of V.
The bee-eaters are sister to a clade that includes the rollers, ground-rollers, todies, motmots, and kingfishers .
Related words
coordinate terms
brother
brethren
related terms
sororal
sistren
suster
sustah
verb
sister (third-person singular simple present sisters, present participle sistering, simple past and past participle sistered)
(transitive, construction) To strengthen (a supporting beam) by fastening a second beam alongside it.
(obsolete, transitive) To be sister to; to resemble closely.
Examples
I’m trying to correct my sagging floor by sistering the joists.
Deep clerks she dumbs; and with her needle composesNature's own shape, of bud, bird, branch, or berry,That even her art sisters the natural roses;Her inkle, silk, twin with the rubied cherry