Sometimes the speaker(or author) specifies what he/she means when he/she uses the word "uncle" for example:
The gelding was mine, a gift from a great-uncle on my mother’s side.(Educated by Tara Westover)
but suppose that you read about someone's uncle in a certain text and the writer doesn't mention if the uncle is:
- his father's brother
- or his mother's brother
- or his father's sister's husband
- or his mother's sister's husband
Could you please tell me how you can recognize which one is the "uncle"?
Basically, is there any "default option" in the absence of uncertain answer?
PS: In some languages like Albanian, Arabic, Persian, and Polish, unlike the English language, no single inclusive term describing both a person's kinship to their parental male sibling or parental male in-law exists. Instead, there are specific terms describing a person's kinship. For example, the Persian language has a special word for the uncle of the father side (amou-عمو) and the uncle of the mother side (daiyee-دایی)
*This postscript was added after some fine answers had been offered.