组 as part of an address in English

[Kenny同志]

When 组is found in an address, for example, 湖南省常德市某某县某某乡某某村某某组, what would make a proper translation?

Many thanks in advance for your help.

Best wishes,

Kenny

[Don_Horhe]

"Neighborhood" and "commune" come to mind, but I don't know if they're appropriate. BTW, I've never seen 组 used like this, is it common?

[edelweis]

@Don Horhe: seems common enough

Google search for "县*乡*村*组"

@kenny: could you explain to us, what 组 means in this context? Is it related to a work unit? to a group of streets? to a hamlet? "section" might be a generic enough English term (but I am not a native English speaker).

[Kenny同志]

Thank you both, Don and Edelweis,

组 is the smallest administrative unit which is immediately under the village level. A village usually consists of a dozen 组s or so.

[skylee]

I wondered about that too. And because I wondered I could not focus on writing it well.

Does it refer to a cluster of houses/homes? If so, could you use "area"? "Section" as suggested by Edelweise also seems ok.

I googled "china province county village 組" and found that many translated it to "group", whereas some translated it to "unit".

[Kenny同志]

Thanks Skylee.

While it can be a cluster of houses in some cases, often, it could be a few clusters.

I once used "Unit", but I feared that the postman could not read it, so I switched to the pinyin-"Zu".

[Daan]

I'd just use Pinyin, exactly for that reason. And because whatever translation you use, it wouldn't make much sense to a native speaker of English anyway.

[Kenny同志]

Thank you Daan for sharing your view. : )