What should we call "American Indians"?

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Since its the week of Columbus Day it seems appropriate to wrestle with that
linguistic legacy of Christopher Columbus- that legacy being the fact that when
you talk about "Indians" - you have to specify "red dot, or feather".

Columbus landed in the Caribean -mistakenly thought he was in the Far East near India-
and when he was greeted by brown people with straight black hair he named
them "Indians".

Half a thousand years later we still refer to descendants of the original inhabitants
of the Americas as "indians".

Problem one: they didnt come from India. Problem two: its confusing- you

have specify which kind of "Indian" you're talking about.

The current 'solution" is to call them "native american".
The trouble with that term is that all of us whom are not immigrants are "native" A
American- because we were born here.


What they really are are "American Aborigonies". So why not call them that?
By the way- "aborigone"(sp?) means "original inhabitants'- it does NOT denote
any level of development (nor lack thereof) of the group in question- as some people think.

Or- we could also call them "Indigenous Americas"- because - thats what they are.

Or -best of all- why not appropriate the related French noun "Indigene" meaning
simply "native", and then modify the meaning slightly to mean 'aborigine" ( ie
that not only the idividual -but his whole linneage are "native").

Then we could call them "American Indigenes".

That way- we wouldnt have to change the initials on their luggage-so to speak!

We would have a hugely better-more accurate- and less confusing noun, but
one that doesnt sound all that different from the old term.

how about we call them Native Americans or "rape victims"?

What's wrong with native americans? That's exactly who they are! Or should we call them just plain Americans, and us paleskins Europeans?

They refer to themselves with the tribal affiliations of course. But that would not work for the rest of the World. There are hundreds of tribes and no one could keep them straight.

Both peoples in America are already pretty happy with native American, changing the term for trivial political correctness seems unwarranted.

We need a LOT of new terms.

"Native American". So an Eskimo is the same as an Apache or a Mayan or an Inca?

"Hispanic" is another dumb word. Is a Spaniard the same as Mexican Aztec without a drop of Spanish blood?

How about "Asian"? Are Indians, Mongolians, Japanese and Thais the same?

In Australia they called the natives Aborigines. More recently they call them "Koories" which no doubt come comes from some native word or other.
The trouble there is that there were hundreds of native languages.

This is not just nit picking. As it stands a blue eyed blond of pure German ancestry who was born in Argentina can move to the USA and get "minority benefits" because he is "Hispanic".

Aborigine is right but i'll put money on them preferring to be known by their tribe rather than whatever a white an wants to call them that particular day

indian = from asia

injun = from america

¡QUE RISAAAA!

I wasn't aware of this. Seems like some tweaking does need to be done.

hello.

I already explained what is wrong with "native american".

Im a blue eyed caucasian of mostly German extraction.
But since I was born in the USA, im a "native american".


But since I am not in the same ethnic category as Hawiian Natives, Eskimos, Navajoes, and Apache, etc. another term is needed as a catch all for folks who's ancestors preceded Columbus in what is now called the Americas to distinguish those folks from myself.


What you probably meant to say was something like this " yeah the term 'native american' is sloppy and inaccurate- but its not as bad as spuriously linking the group to the Ganges River by calling them 'Indians' so lets all just go with that "

Maybe so.

But for most of American history 'native american' meant a White European who was born in the USA. Politicians who campained against immigration were called "nativists".
Pat Buchanan is a modern day "nativist" who is a "native american' in the old sense, but
not in the current fad way that the term is used.

On the other hand- the biggest group of immigrants to America today- are the Spanish speakers
who cross the rio grande from Mexico and/or central america who are mostly the brown skinned descendants of the Maya, the Aztecs, Jivaro, etc., with little or no "Spanish" blood.

So today's NON-native Americans are usually mostly- or entirely- "Native American" (in the modern sense). Unlike most "native americans' (like me, Pat Buchanan , and Barack Obama) who are rarely 'native american".

But even these millions of Spanish speaking "Non-native Native Americans" did not come from tribes that
inhabited what is now the United States-as did tribes like the Iroquis and the Navajo.

So if you ARE an Iriquois, or a Navajo, these brown skinned Spanish speaking migrants are just as contemptable as - Barack Obama, Pat Buchana, and myself,- just another bunch of foreign invaders!

So lumping the spanish speaking non native native americans with the english speaking NATIVE native americans might be offensive to the latter.

But we could call both groups something else-like "american aborigines". Then you would be able to speak about "native american aborogines", and "immigrant american aborigines"- avoiding confusion and offensiveness.

Over here, we have to call them indianer (Indians). Saying "infödda amerikaner" ("Native amerikans") does both sound racist (the "infödda" part is related to the word "inföding", "native" in english, which is kinda politically incorrect) and dumb.

Hm... I'm 1/32 Cherokee, 31/32 white (mostly English and Danish). What do you call me?

White.

Whatever you do, apparently you're not supposed to call them "chief"...

You know what I don't get? The term "latino" to refer to a mexican.

??

From looking into it just a little bit it seems to come from the fact that the Spanish language originates with Latin. Do they call people in Spain "latinos"? Because it seems to be a mostly Central/South American thing.

Thats like calling people in the US "germanics" because a lot of the words of English are derived from German roots.

So wierd.

Humans?

Native American works for me.

And I happen to be one, not that it matters.