There is an ongoing discussion about the terminology used by theIndigenous peoples of the Americas to describe themselves, as well as how they prefer to be referred to by others. Preferred terms vary primarily by region and age. As Indigenous peoples and communities are diverse, there is no consensus on naming.
After Europeans reached the Americas, they called most of the Indigenous people collectively "Indians". The distinct people in theArctic were called "Eskimos".Eskimo has declined in usage.[1]
When discussing broad groups of peoples, naming may be based on shared language, region, or historical relationship, such asAnishinaabeg,Tupi–Guarani-speaking peoples,Pueblo-dwelling peoples,Amazonian tribes, orLDN peoples (Lakota,Dakota, andNakota peoples).
Although "Indian" is the most common collective name, many Englishexonyms have been used to refer to the Indigenous peoples of theAmericas (also known as theNew World), who were resident within their own territories whenEuropean colonists arrived in the 15th and 16th centuries. Some of these names were based onFrench,Spanish, or other European language terminology used by earlier explorers and colonists, many of which were derived from the names that tribes called each other. Some resulted from the colonists' attempt to translateendonyms from the native language into their own, or to transliterate by sound. In addition, some names or terms were pejorative, arising from prejudice and fear, during periods of conflict (such as theAmerican Indian Wars) between the cultures involved.
In the 20th and 21st centuries, there has been greater awareness among non-Indigenous peoples that Indigenous peoples in the Americas have been active in discussions of how they wish to be known. Indigenous people have pressed for the elimination of terms they consider to be obsolete, inaccurate, orracist. During the latter half of the 20th century and the rise of theRed Power movement, theUnited States government responded by proposing the use of the term "Native American" to recognize the primacy of Indigenous peoples' tenure in the country. The term has become widespread nationally but only partially accepted by various Indigenous groups. Other naming conventions have been proposed and used, but none is accepted by all Indigenous groups. Typically, each name has a particular audience and political or cultural connotation, and regional usage varies.
In Canada, the term "First Nations" is generally used for peoples covered by theIndian Act, and "Indigenous peoples" used for Native peoples more generally, includingInuit andMétis, who do not fall under the "First Nations" category.Status Indian remains a legal designation because of the Indian Act.
Europeans at the time ofChristopher Columbus'svoyage often referred to all of South and East Asia as "India" or "the Indias/Indies", sometimes dividing the area into "Greater India", "Middle India", and "Lesser India".[2] Theoldest surviving terrestrial globe, byMartin Behaim in 1492 (before Columbus' voyage), labels the entire Asian subcontinent region[clarification needed] as "India",[3] named ultimately after theIndus River.
Columbus carried a passport inLatin from the Spanish monarchs that dispatched himad partes Indie ("toward the regions of India") on their behalf. When he landed in theAntilles, Columbus referred to the resident peoples he encountered there as "Indians", reflecting his purported belief that he had reached the Indian Ocean.[4] The name was adopted by other Spanish and ultimately other Europeans; for centuries the Indigenous peoples of the Americas were collectively called "Indians" in various European languages. This misnomer was perpetuated in place naming; the islands of theCaribbean were named, and are still known as, theWest Indies.[citation needed]
As European colonists began to settle in the Americas in the 16th and 17th centuries, and had more sustained contact with the resident peoples, they understood that the residents were not a homogeneous group sharing a unified culture and government, but discrete societies with their own distinct languages and social systems. Early historical accounts show that some colonists, including Jesuit missionaries in New France, attempted to learn and record theautonyms of these individual groups, but the use of the general term "Indian" persisted.[citation needed]
In 1968, theAmerican Indian Movement (AIM) was founded in the United States. In 1977, a delegation from theInternational Indian Treaty Council, an arm of AIM, elected to collectively identify as "American Indian", at the United NationsConference on Indians in the Americas inGeneva, Switzerland. Some Indigenous activists and public figures, such asRussell Means (Oglala Lakota), have preferred "American Indian" to the more recently adopted "Native American".[5][6] According to theNational Museum of the American Indian, "In the United States, Native American has been widely used but is falling out of favor with some groups, and the terms American Indian or Indigenous American are preferred by many Native people."[7]
The term American Indian is the accepted term used by theUnited States Government, by theNational Museum of the American Indian, theColonial Williamsburg Foundation, and other institutions.[8] According to theEncyclopedia Britannica, "in the United States, many individuals of indigenous heritage continue to refer to aboriginal Americans, in aggregate, as Indians."[9]
In the late 20th century, some etymologists suggested that the origin of the term was not from a confusion with India, but from the Spanish expressionEn Dios, meaning "in God", or a similar one in Italian.[10] David Wilton notes inWord Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends that this phrase does not appear in any of Columbus' writing. Wilton says that many European languages since Greek and Roman times used variations of the term "Indian" to describe the peoples of the Indian subcontinent, more than a millennium before the voyages of Columbus.[10]
In the 17th century, Quechua noblemanFelipe Guaman Poma de Ayala claimed that the word Indian derived from "en dia," meaning "in day," referring to theInca Empire's altitude and proximity to the sun.[11]
Objections to the usage of "Indian" and "American Indian" include the fact that "Indian" arose from a historical error, and does not accurately reflect the origin of the people to whom it refers. In addition, some feel that the term has so absorbed negative and demeaning connotations through its historical usage as to render it objectionable in context. Additionally, "American Indian" is often understood to mean only the peoples of the mainland body of the United States, which excludes otherpeoples consideredIndigenous peoples of the Americas; includingInuit (includingInupiat),Yupik peoples (Yuit/Alutiiq/Cup'ik), andAleut (i.e., the groups whose traditional languages areEskimo–Aleut languages). Related groups among these tribal peoples are referred to collectively as eitherAlaskan Natives (based on geography),First Nations (in Canada), orSiberians.
Supporters of the terms "Indian" and "American Indian" argue that they have been in use for such a long time that many people have become accustomed to them and no longer consider themexonyms. Both terms are still widely used today. "American Indian" appears often in treaties between the United States and the Indigenous peoples with whom they have been negotiating since the colonial period, and many federal, state, and local laws also use it.[12] "American Indian" andAlaska Native are the terms used in the United States Census.[13]
TheOxford English Dictionary cites usage of the uncapitalized termnative American in several publications dating to 1737,[14] but it is unclear whether these texts refer to Indigenous peoples, or topersons born on American soil. One early use is the 1817 novelKeep Cool byJohn Neal, which declares "the Indian is the only native American; he holds his charter from God himself".[15] During the 1850s, a group ofAnglo-Saxon Protestant Americans used the capitalized termNative Americans to differentiate themselves from recentIrish andGerman immigrants, both of which groups were predominantly Catholic. The group later formed the "Know-Nothings", a 19th-century political party thatopposed immigration to the United States, a policy known asnativism. The Know-Nothings also called themselves the "Native American Party" and were referred to in the press with the capitalized term.[16]
In 1918, leaders of the IndigenousPeyote Religion incorporated as theNative American Church of Oklahoma.[17] In 1956, British writerAldous Huxley wrote to thank a correspondent for "your most interesting letter about the Native American churchmen".[14]
The use ofNative American ornative American to refer to Indigenous peoples who live in the Americas came into widespread, common use during thecivil rights era of the 1960s and 1970s. This term was considered to represent historical fact more accurately (i.e., "Native" cultures predated European colonization). In addition, activists also believed it was free of negative historical connotations that had come to be associated with previous terms.
Between 1982 and 1993, most Americanmanuals of style came to agree that "color terms" referring to ethnic groups, such as Black, should be capitalized as proper names, as well asNative American.[18] By 2020, "Indigenous" was also included in these capitalization guidelines.[19][20]
Other objections toNative American—whether capitalized or not—include a concern that it is often understood to exclude American groups outside the contiguous United States (e.g., Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico), and Indigenous groups in South America, Mexico, and Canada. The wordAmerican is sometimes questioned because the people referred to resided in the Americas before they were so named.[21]
As of 1995, according to theUS Census Bureau, 50% of people who identified as Indigenous preferred the termAmerican Indian, 37% preferredNative American, and the remainder preferred other terms or had no preference.[22]
According toThe American Heritage Dictionary, "Indigenous specifies that something or someone is native rather than coming or being brought in from elsewhere: an indigenous crop; theAinu, a people Indigenous to the northernmost islands of Japan."[23]
The United NationsWorld Summit on Sustainable Development used the term "Indigenous peoples" for the first time in its official political declaration in 2002. Before this date, the term was considered to be "still under debate" for usage in official UN documents.[24]
The English adjective "aboriginal" and the noun "aborigine" come from a Latin phrase meaning "from the origin"; theancient Romans used it to refer to acontemporary group, one of manyancient peoples in Italy. Until about 1910, these terms were used in English to refer to various Indigenous peoples. Today throughout most of the English-speaking world, it is most commonly understood to refer to theIndigenous Australians, with the notable exception of Canada, where the term "aboriginal" (but not aborigine) came into use in the Canadian Constitution Act, 1982.[25]
"Alaska Native" refers to the Indigenous peoples inAlaska, including theAleut,Athabascan,Haida,Inuit (Inupiat),[26]Tlingit,Yup'ik (Cup'ik,Alutiiq, etc.), andYupik peoples. The term predominates because of its legal use in theAlaska Native Claims Settlement Act, and includes all the above-named peoples. While Athabascans, Haida, Eyak, and Tlingit are American Indians,[27] Inuit, Yupik, and Unangan (Aleut) are not.[28] Likewise, Yupik, Unangan, and Inuit are all distinct peoples with distinct languages.[28]
The termEskimo was once common, but it is now perceived as derogatory and is being replaced in common use with "Inuit" or individual groups' own names for themselves.[1][29][30] As mentioned above, Yupik and Unangan are distinct from Inuit.[28]
In addition to being a name imposed from outside rather than an Inuit term, one reason thatEskimo is considered derogatory is the widespread, but incorrect, perception[31][32][33][34] that inAlgonkian languages, spoken by some competitive historic tribes of present-day Canada and US, it means "eaters of raw meat".[35][36]
TheInuit Circumpolar Conference meeting inBarrow, Alaska (now Utqiaġvik), in 1977 officially adopted "Inuit" as a designation for the circumpolar Indigenous groups of the United States, Canada, Greenland, and Russia.[37]
The term "Amerind"/"Amerindian" is aportmanteau of "American Indian". It was coined in 1902 by theAmerican Anthropological Association, but from its creation has been controversial. It was rejected by some leading members of the Association, and while adopted by many it was never universally accepted.[38] Usage in English occurs primarily in anthropological and linguistic contexts, rather than Native American ones; it also finds some use in news outlets in describing theTaíno people of Puerto Rico.[39] The term "Amerind" has official status in Guyana.[40]
The CanadianIndian Act, first passed in 1876, in defining the rights of people of recognized First Nations, refers to them as "Indians".[41] The responsible federal government department was the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, nowIndigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, headed by theMinister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs. The Act officially recognizes people commonly known as "Status Indians", although "Registered Indian" is the official term for those on theIndian Register. Lands set aside for the use of First Nations are officially known asIndian reserves (abbreviated IR on maps, etc.).[42] The word "band" is used inband government. Some First Nations communities also use "Indian Band" in their official names.
In Canada, the term "Aboriginal peoples in Canada" is used for all Indigenous peoples within the country, including theInuit andFirst Nations, as well as theMétis.[42] More recently,[when?] the term Indigenous peoples has been used more frequently and in 2015 the federal government department responsible for First Nations, Metis, and Inuit issues changed its name fromAboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada toIndigenous and Northern Affairs Canada.[43][44]
"First Nations" came into common usage in the 1980s to replace the term "Indian band".[45] Elder Sol Sanderson says that he coined the term in the early 1980s.[46] Others state that the term came into common usage in the 1970s to avoid using the word "Indian", which some people considered offensive. Apparently, no legal definition of the term exists. However, theAssembly of First Nations, the national advocacy group for First Nations peoples, adopted the term in 1985.[47] The singular commonly used is "First Nations person" (when gender-specific, "First Nations man" or "First Nations woman").
"First Peoples" is a broad term that includes First Nations,Inuit, andMétis. Owing to its similarity to the term "First Nations", the two terms are sometimes used interchangeably.
"Native" or "Native Canadian" is an ambiguous term, but people frequently use it in conversation or informal writing. A majority use this term for describing Indigenous peoples, including some Indigenous people themselves. This is considered to be quite offensive as Indigenous peoples living in Canada existed prior to colonization and some do not view themselves as Canadians.[48]
InCanadian French, the terms arepremière(s) nation(s) for "First Nations" andautochtone for "Aboriginal" (used both as a noun and adjective).
The termindien orindienne has historically been used in the legislation, notably in theLoi sur les Indiens (The Indian Act), but it is unacceptable outside of this specific context. First Nations in Québec have also called for the termamérindien to be discontinued, in favour ofautochtone. The wordamérindien contains the wordindien (Indian) and since they are not Indians, the word is no longer favored and it has, for example, been removed from some elementary school textbooks.[49][50] The termindigène is not used as it is seen as having negative connotations because of its similarity to the Frenchindigent ("poor"). It has also acquired further negative associations in French, owing to theindigénat code enforced in French colonial Africa, 1887–1947. The old French termsauvage ("wild, savage") is no longer used either, as it is considered pejorative or racist.[51]
The people of the Canadian Arctic are officially known as the Inuit, which means 'the people', or singularly,Inuk, which means 'the person',[52] as a result of the 1977 Inuit Circumpolar Conference.Canada's Constitution Act, 1982, uses "Inuit", as does the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the national organization that represents the Inuit in Canada.[53] The preferred term in Canada's Central Arctic isInuinnaq,[54] and in the eastern Canadian ArcticInuit. The language is often calledInuktitut, though other local designations are also used.
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TheAlgonquinautonymAnishinaabe (alsoAnishinabe,Anicinape) is used as a cross-tribal term in Algonquian-majority areas, such as Anishnabe Health, Anishnabe Education, and Training Circle. The term is also used among historically Anishinaabe peoples in theUpper Midwest region of the United States.
TheChinook Jargon, the old trade language of the Pacific Northwest, usessiwash (an adaptation of the Frenchsauvage) for "Indian", "Native American", or "First Nations", either as adjective or noun. While normally meaning a male native, it is used in certain combinations, such assiwash cosho ("a seal", literally "Indian pig" or "Indian pork"). Many native communities perceive the termssauvage andsiwash negatively, but others use it freely. They consider use by non-natives to be derogatory. In the creolized form of Chinook Jargon spoken at theGrand Ronde Agency in Oregon, a distinction is made betweensiwash andsawash. The accent in the latter is on the second syllable, resembling the French original, and is used in Grand Ronde Jargon meaning "anything native or Indian"; by contrast, they considersiwash to be defamatory.[55]
The Chinook Jargon term for a native woman isklootchman, an originallyNootka word adopted in regional English to mean a native woman or, as in the Jargon, all women and also anything female. It originated as a compound of Nootkałūts 'female' with the English suffix-man.Hyas klootchman tyee means "queen",klootchman cosho, "sow"; andklootchman tenas ortenas klootchman means "girl" or "little girl". Generallyklootchman in regional English simply means a native woman and has not acquired the derisive sense ofsiwash orsquaw. The short formklootch, encountered only in English-Chinook hybrid phrasings, is always derisive, especially in forms such asblue-eyed klootch.[56]
InMexico, the preferred expression used by both the Government and the media is "Indigenous peoples" (pueblos indígenas inSpanish).[57]
During the late 20th century the term "Indigenous peoples" evolved into a political term that refers to ethnic groups with historical ties to groups that existed in a territory prior tocolonization or formation of anation state. The "I" is always capitalized as it is in references to a group of people.[58] In the Americas, the term "Indigenous peoples of the Americas" was adopted, and the term is tailored to specific geographic or political regions, such as "Indigenous peoples of Panama". "'Indigenous peoples' ... is a term that internationalizes the experiences, the issues and the struggles of some of the world's colonized peoples", writesMāori educatorLinda Tuhiwai Smith. "The final 's' in 'Indigenous peoples' ... [is] a way of recognizing that there are real differences between different Indigenous peoples."[59]
A rarely used term is to call the North American continent:Turtle Island. Though officially namedNorth America, a number of histories from various countries make reference to the myth of a continent existing atop a turtle's back. Though not present across all nations and countries, this symbolism and icon has spread to become nearly pan-Indigenous. As Europeans, Asians and Africans have terms that allude to their home continents, "Turtle Islander"[60] is an attempt to do just that.[61][62]
In some situations, the term "Indian princess" is considered offensive.
There is also a positive usage among somepowwow organizations, colleges, and other Indigenous groups who holdpageants and scholarship competitions, who may use the term "Princess" as a component in the titles they award. Generally, these events are for recognizing cultural skills and community leadership.[63] However, some have called for participants to stop using the term "Princess" for these titles, due to the negativestereotypes and the discomfort the nomenclature can cause when interacting with non-Natives, and to replace the term with "more culturally relevant and accurate nomenclature."[64]
"Injun" is an originally 17th-century mispronunciation of "Indian", sometimes considered offensive today, used to impersonate and sometimes mock Native Americans' or early settlers' supposed heavily accented English (e.g., "Honest Injun", "Injun time").[65] The word and related terms have been defined as derogatory by some Indigenous peoples and are not widely used.
Both Americans and Europeans have historically calledNative Americans "Red Indians". The term was largely used in the 18th to 20th centuries, partially based on thecolor metaphors for race which colonists and settlers historically used in North America and Europe, and also to distinguish Native Americans from theIndian people ofIndia.[citation needed]
The term "Red Indians" was also more specifically used by Europeans to refer to theBeothuk, a people living onNewfoundland who usedred ochre in spring to paint not only their bodies, but also their houses, canoes, weapons, household appliances and musical instruments.[66]
The term "Redskins" is now mostly seen, by Native Americans in particular, as pejorative and offensive,[67][68][69] as it is the term that was used for body parts used as "proof of kill" when Native Americans were hunted for bounty by colonists on the frontier.[70][71][72] There was an AmericanNational Football League teamnamed the Washington Redskins until 2020, and "Redskin" is the name of the mascot at theRed Mesa High School on theNavajo Reservation inTeec Nos Pos, Arizona.[73] Native Americans have beenprotesting against the use of these names by non-Natives since the 1970s.[74][75]
TheNational Congress of American Indians (NCAI) maintains that names likeRedskins perpetuate negative stereotypes of Native Americans, "Often citing a long held myth by non-Native people that 'Indian' mascots 'honor Native people', American sports businesses such as the NFL'sWashington 'Redskins'... continue to profit from harmful stereotypes originated during a time when white superiority and segregation were commonplace."[76][77]
Anthropologists once usedsavage as a blanket term to refer to Indigenous peoples worldwide (for example,Bronisław Malinowski titled his 1929 studyThe Sexual Life of Savages in North-Western Melanesia). At the beginning of the nineteenth century, representatives of the relatively new United States government often used the term in official records when referring to Indian nations (e.g., Justice Baldwin's concurring opinion inCherokee Nation v. Georgia[78]). This was related to their association of non-Christian people as savages. Early anthropologistLewis H. Morgan posited inAncient Society (1877) a three-partevolution of societies from, in his terms, savagery through barbarism to civilization.EuropeanChristians once broadly used the word "heathens" to refer to Native Americans, a pejorative Christian term that refers to people who do not worship the Christian god.[citation needed]
The English word "squaw", when used to refer to Indigenous women, is consideredmisogynist andracist.[79][80][81][82] Although there has been some controversy on the topic, it is almost always grouped with other words that carry a colonial implication ofexotic inferiority based on race, such as "negress".[83] There is a movement to remove the name "squaw" from geographic place names across the United States.[81] There is a minority counter-movement among a small number of academics to "reclaim" what they claim is the possible original meaning of the word, as anin-group term, which could still be offensive if used outside of thatspeech community. But even this usage would only be relevant to the original, Algonquian-languagephonemes of the word—the small parts that make up larger, historical forms—not the English form currently used as a slur. Any effort at "reclamation" would not apply to the much largerNative American community of women who are affected by this slur, as Algonquian-speakers make up only a small minority of those affected by it.[82][84]
Although the name "Eskimo" was commonly used in Alaska to refer to Inuit and Yupik people of the world, this usage is now considered unacceptable by many or even most Alaska Natives, largely since it is a colonial name imposed by non-Indigenous people.
indian in dios wilton.
During this time the Indies of Peru were discovered, and the news spread throughout Castile and Rome that it was land en el dia, a higher level than Castile, Rome and Turkey. Thus it was called land en el dia, India, land rich in gold and silver.
The news organization will also now capitalize Indigenous in reference to original inhabitants of a place.
'We would capitalize "Indigenous" in both contexts: that of Indigenous people and groups, on the one hand, and Indigenous culture and society, on the other. Lowercase "indigenous" would be reserved for contexts in which the term does not apply to Indigenous people, for example, indigenous plant and animal species.'
Some people get upset about "American Indian" because of its association with Columbus. There is an equally serious dilemma with the use of "Native American," which came into vogue as part of a concern for "political correctness." The latter was an effort to acknowledge ethnic diversity in the United States while insisting on an over-arching American unity. Groups became identified as hyphen-American. Thus, African-American, Irish-American, Italian-American, and so on. For the original inhabitants of the land, the "correct" term became Native-American.
Whereas the term "Eskimo" is not an Inuit term, and is not one that Inuit have themselves adopted; . . . Let it therefore be resolved that the research, science, and other communities be called upon to use the term "Inuit", instead of "Eskimo" and "paleo-Inuit" instead of "paleo-Eskimo" in the publications of research findings and other documents.
isbn:0810850583.
SOL SANDERSON: ...if you've ever wondered where that term First Nations came from, I coined that in the early 80s when we were disputing in our forum about our positions on the agenda that we wanted to advance respecting the constitution. ...
n. Offensive Slang Used as a disparaging term for a Native American.
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)Let's just agree the following words are never okay to call Indigenous peoples: savage, red Indian, redskin, primitive, half-breed, squaw/brave/papoose.
Through communication and education American Indian people have come to understand the derogatory meaning of the word. American Indian women claim the right to define ourselves as women and we reject the offensive term squaw.
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