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Wheat has been man's next of kin.

Does this sentence make sense to native English speakers??

It's supposed to be a simile, meaning wheat is like family to humans.

It's a translated sentence from a Persian text.

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    Yes, it's a good metaphor. But you don't just adopt one phrase; if you use it, you have to maintain the point of view and treat it as a family member when you write about it. Metaphors come in frames and the Farm/Food/Family frame is a particularly robust one.
    – John Lawler
    Commented Apr 27, 2020 at 14:21
  • Thanks 👍🏻👍🏻
    – AMEnglish
    Commented Apr 27, 2020 at 14:25
  • The use of novel metaphor is always a tricky area. I'd avoid this one, because of the overlap between tenor and vehicle. "Fish is chips' next of kin" doesn't have that problem, but still sounds better avoided. "Wheat has always borne a close relationship with mankind" is better, but I'm still not happy. "Mankind's relationship with wheat ..." perhaps.
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Apr 27, 2020 at 14:28

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This sounds very strange to me. "Next of kin" describes a close blood relationship, which typically carries legal obligations like inheritance, medical decision making, etc. To say that wheat is man's next of kin seems like a massive overstatement of that relationship - there is no genetic link whatsoever, and it would be unusual to have a very close personal "kinship" bond with a plant that can't really do anything except sit in place and grow.

You might be able to jokingly say "my dog is my next of kin", since that at least carries some form of personal bond that would be reminiscent of kinship. But to say that a species of plant is the next of kin of a species of animal implies a personal, genetic, or societal link between the two, none of which are really the case. Mankind is not rearing wheat to one day take its place, which is what one generally does with a next of kin.

In sum, "next of kin" can be used in a non-literal sense, but it carries the connotation of a close personal bond, as well as the sense of the succession of a lineage. Wheat seems far too dissimilar to a person or a normal "kin" relationhip to aptly describe it as man's "next of kin" (unless you happen to be writing a book about a post-apocalytic world that is dominated by wheat).

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"Next of kin" is often used metaphorically.

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