Learning to Speak
I wonder if the designation for mother became mama because it's the elemental way an infant can change the shape of their tongue and lips to create syllables if they're raised around a Roman language.
When we first enrolled S— into daycare, we had to fill out a form that asked how many words the child knows how to speak. We wrote none, only because I didn't think mama and dada were really words. They felt and still feel more like reflexive designations, not words one learns.
I have always felt ambivalent that another human's linguistic practice begins with me, or rather who I became as a result of their birth. When I was pregnant I had unrealistic goals that S's first word would be their own name.