Who are Native Americans?

[Bernieyeball]

I always get grief when I pose this question but I think it is a reasonable inquiry.
I suspect the humans who inhabited this continent before the arrival of Europeans did not call it North America or America.
How can they be Native "Americans"?

[qpw3141]

It's not the most apposite of names because it means something completely different from native <anything else>.

On the other hand, it's arguably more apposite than 'Indians'.

[Miller]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

It's not the most apposite of names because it means something completely different from native <anything else>.

On the other hand, it's arguably more apposite than 'Indians'.

Okay, your arguments have convinced me that "Native Americans" is pointlessly ambiguous and clearly coined by people who have trouble counting past ten with their shoes on. So, what term should we use instead, particularly given that "Indian" is even more ambiguous?

[MrDibble]

I like the Canadian "First Nations", myself.

[smiling bandit]

Originally Posted by MrDibble

I like the Canadian "First Nations", myself.

I dislike this because it's so faux respectful, and possibly not true. They weren't really particularly connected in any meaningful way, so given a choice I wouldn't call them anything as an arbitrary group. They definitely weren't nations and they might not have been first.

Thus, I prefer the nom de guerre Amerindians if I must use something. Tacking the "-indians" on may not make that much sense, but it's not like the people who first called them that had ever met actual the other kind.

[tomndebb]

Originally Posted by Bernieyeball

I always get grief when I pose this question but I think it is a reasonable inquiry.
I suspect the humans who inhabited this continent before the arrival of Europeans did not call it North America or America.
How can they be Native "Americans"?

If you always get grief, it seems to mean that you are asking the question a lot. Since your question attempts to insist on some (undefined, yet rigid), definition of words with some implied but not explained logic; I can see why you would get grief for it. Language is rarely bound by external laws of logic.

Basically, the word used in English, (where the phrase occurs), to identify the two major land masses and related islands that are separated from Eurasia and Africa by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans is "America," (North and South). The people who lived here before the arrival of the English speaking settlers from Europe would be considered natives. Hence, the phrase "Native American" can be used to identify them in English.

This, of course, is completely separate from the matter that the people so identified do not actually choose that phrase for self-identification, generally preferring their tribal name, (either in its original form or in its Anglicized variant), or accepting the equally "erroneous" term "indian."

[The Flying Dutchman]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

Basically, the word used in English, (where the phrase occurs), to identify the two major land masses and related islands that are separated from Eurasia and Africa by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans is "America," (North and South).

That doesn't cover the native Hawaiins, also considered native Americans.

The people who lived here before the arrival of the English speaking settlers from Europe would be considered natives. Hence, the phrase "Native American" can be used to identify them in English.

This should be news for the French and the Spanish settlers here before Jamestown.

[tomndebb]

Originally Posted by The Flying Dutchman

That doesn't cover the native Hawaiins, also considered native Americans.

"Native American" is pretty much never used by Yanks to refer to aboriginal Hawaiians. They tend to be called Hawaiian or Polynesian. I would not claim that the term is never applied to them, but is so rare as to be insignificant. (The same thing tends to be true of the Eskimoes, although as mainlanders associated with neighboring non-Eskimo peoples, the term might occasionally show up there.)

Originally Posted by The Flying Dutchman

This should be news for the French and the Spanish settlers here before Jamestown.

A rather pointless nitpick, given that the Spaniards were driven from Florida and the French were vastly outnumbered by English in Detroit and Vincennes as soon as the English arrived. A tiny number of outliers does not change the general movement or the language. (And remember, "Native American" tends to be a U.S. term, so the people employing it are not really looking at Quebec or Mexico City when they use it.)

[Lemur866]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

The same thing tends to be true of the Eskimoes, although as mainlanders associated with neighboring non-Eskimo peoples, the term might occasionally show up there.

In Alaska, Eskimos are called Eskimos. But the more usual term is "native" or "Alaska native", which means Eskimo or Athabaskan or Indian or Aleut. Most white people just lump everyone into the "native" category unless there's a particular reason not to. And of course, "native" can be used with a certain tone of voice that turns it from a neutral descriptor into an ethnic slur, I'm sure everyone has heard "black" used the same way.

[The Flying Dutchman]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

A rather pointless nitpick, given that the Spaniards were driven from Florida and the French were vastly outnumbered by English in Detroit and Vincennes as soon as the English arrived. A tiny number of outliers does not change the general movement or the language. (And remember, "Native American" tends to be a U.S. term, so the people employing it are not really looking at Quebec or Mexico City when they use it.)

This is pure bullshit. We simply do not define "native americans " any where in the New World continents or in the United States of America or anywhere else on the globe based on who lived where before English speakers arrived anywhere. It was a completely stupid statement on your part and frankly, I know that you know that as well.

"Native americans" is a term commonly used in Canada as well when we refer to your aboriginals or first nations. You Americans don't own the English language.

[tomndebb]

Originally Posted by The Flying Dutchman

This is pure bullshit. We simply do not define "native americans " any where in the New World continents or in the United States of America or anywhere else on the globe based on who lived where before English speakers arrived anywhere. It was a completely stupid statement on your part and frankly, I know that you know that as well.

I know that you are getting awfully testy over a rather minor nitpick.
Whatever settlers arrived from Europe before the British involved fewer than a couple thousand people (in a land populated by many millions) and began fewer than 110 years prior to the arrival of the British, (as opposed to the several thousand years that people migrating from Asia had been here).

Originally Posted by The Flying Dutchman

"Native americans" is a term commonly used in Canada as well when we refer to your aboriginals or first nations. You Americans don't own the English language.

I never claimed that the U.S. owned the language. I am sorry to hear that some of your co-nationalists have picked up some of the bad habits of their Southern neighbors, given that the people identified as "Native Americans" generally eschew that phrase, themselves.

[Smeghead]

See, there's this place, right? And it's called "America", OK? And the people that live there, well, they're called "Americans". But a lot of them are descended from people who moved there recently, yes? And so to distinguish the ones that were there first, the "natives", we combine those two concepts into the term "Native American".

I hope that clears things up.

[qpw3141]

Originally Posted by Smeghead

See, there's this place, right? And it's called "America", OK? And the people that live there, well, they're called "Americans". But a lot of them are descended from people who moved there recently, yes? And so to distinguish the ones that were there first, the "natives", we combine those two concepts into the term "Native American".

I hope that clears things up.

Not really because it doesn't make a lot of sense.

Which of the following means something completely different to all the others.

Native Londoner
Native New Yorker
Native Californian
Native Italian
Native American
Native Texan
Native Mexican

[BrightNShiny]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

Not really because it doesn't make a lot of sense.

Which of the following means something completely different to all the others.

Native Londoner
Native New Yorker
Native Californian
Native Italian
Native American
Native Texan
Native Mexican

You do realize that words in English can have more than one meaning, right?

[qpw3141]

Originally Posted by BrightNShiny

You do realize that words in English can have more than one meaning, right?

Yes, but in that case it's generally the context that let's you know which meaning applies.

You know: 'I filled the pitcher with water' is not usually understood to mean that you were torturing some baseball player at Guantanamo Bay.

If someone says: 'He's a native American', it could mean he's someone who was born and lives in the USA or it could mean that he belongs to the group of people also know as 'American Indians'.

Whilst it's good to try and use nomenclature that no one finds offensive it's also a good idea to avoid picking identifiers that already have a perfectly clear (and different) meaning.

[Marley23]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

Yes, but in that case it's generally the context that let's you know which meaning applies.

That's also the case here. I don't think I've ever heard a person born in America described as a "native American" (other than a joke on the Simpsons) because people know it might be taken as referring to Native American heritage.

Whilst it's good to try and use nomenclature that no one finds offensive it's also a good idea to avoid picking identifiers that already have a perfectly clear (and different) meaning.

This describes "Indian" perfectly.

And to the OP... they were native to the place that is now called America. See?

[BrightNShiny]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

Yes, but in that case it's generally the context that let's you know which meaning applies.

You know: 'I filled the pitcher with water' is not usually understood to mean that you were torturing some baseball player at Guantanamo Bay.

There are tons of constructions in English which are ambiguous on their face and require additional context to clarify. "He's an engineer." Does he work on a train or does he design circuits? "She's mad." Is she angry or is she crazy? Do you find yourself complaining about these too?

If someone says: 'He's a native American', it could mean he's someone who was born and lives in the USA or it could mean that he belongs to the group of people also know as 'American Indians'.

In most cases it will mean the latter, some times it will mean the former. So what?

Whilst it's good to try and use nomenclature that no one finds offensive it's also a good idea to avoid picking identifiers that already have a perfectly clear (and different) meaning.

As far as I know, most people understand what the term "Native American" is referring to, particularly if it's in the context of the discussion they're having. You've been given a clear definition of the term, and yet you somehow think that this clear definition is confusing. Your beef seems to be with the way the English language develops rather than this term in particular. ETA: Did you have trouble figuring out that "beef" here means complaint rather than the meat from a cow?

[42fish]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

Which of the following means something completely different to all the others.

Native Londoner
Native New Yorker
Native Californian
Native Italian
Native American
Native Texan
Native Mexican

"Native New Yorker"--it's the only one that's a disco hit.


(PS: If I call Bob a "native New Yorker," is he a native of the state or the city?)

[qpw3141]

Originally Posted by 42fish

"Native New Yorker"--it's the only one that's a disco hit.


(PS: If I call Bob a "native New Yorker," is he a native of the state or the city?)

LOL.

Yes, and anyway it seems I was 100% wrong on this.

What's weird is that it took five days before anyone actually got around to checking and pointed out that primary error that completely invalidated my objection. (And then couldn't seem to stop. )

[BrightNShiny]

Dictionary: A book where you can look up the meaning of words. See here for definitions.

[Latro]

How about "Aborigines" ?

But then, it now seems like there were people before the "American-Indians" arrived in the america's.

Would those be Pre-Aborigines.

[Krokodil]

It would be nice if the Indians (a term most of them apparently use, however grudgingly) had some old pre-Columbian term that applied to all the tribes from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but they apparently didn't and saw no need for one.

[DrFidelius]

Which is why I always refer to my Wife's extended family as "Redskins," to avoid confusion (except with sunburned people).

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

Originally Posted by Bernieyeball

I always get grief when I pose this question but I think it is a reasonable inquiry.
I suspect the humans who inhabited this continent before the arrival of Europeans did not call it North America or America.
How can they be Native "Americans"?

Lemme ask you a question: was the poet Homer a European? He did not call the place he lived "Europe."

Is it reasonable to refer to Lucy, the early human, as an early African?

There's a type of bird called the American swallow-tailed kite. I'm pretty sure these birds don't call the place they live America. Is the name therefore a misnomer?

[TWDuke]

[Abe Simpson mode]I first recall hearing the term Native American on an episode of the TV show Alice in which Larry Hovis corrects someone who says "Indian." At the time it offended me a bit, because I thought it implied that the rest of us who have lived our entire lives here aren't native Americans. I had no problem with saying native American peoples or native American culture, but applying it to individuals of a particular ancestry seemed to exclude the majority of native Americans.

But you know what? I've realized in the past 20-odd years it doesn't hurt me a bit. Most people who meet me assume I was born in this country, and if someone happens to think I'm from Canada, it's no skin off my nose anyway.

Now, what if someone who looks Asian or Hispanic or speaks with an accent but was born in the United States wants to distinguish himself from immigrants? He can always say he is a native-born American. Yes, it's an extra syllable, but it doesn't seem like an undue hardship.

Finally, the term Native American seems to be one I only hear on TV or radio anyway. In conversation, I think people are much more likely to say Indian or, when more clarity is needed, American Indian. (I'm fairly certain I've never heard "Amerind" or "Amerindian" spoken aloud, although I've seen them in print.)

The much more common and traditional term "natural born citizen" is preferred, if distinguishing a born citizen from a naturalized citizen is relevant and necessary.

Someone can be a "natural born citizen" without ever having been to this country, which is why I suggested "native-born" for someone who was actually born within its borders.

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

qpw, all languages are rife with ambiguities. This is how language works. Examine your last response to me: grammatically it doesn't even make any sense, given that it appears to be missing a predicate to a nested dependent clause. But again, how language works is that I'm able to figure out your meaning without difficulty.

You're complaining about a central feature of language. What's interesting is the particular example that you're harping about.

If the phrase "Native American" virtually never causes confusion, and if it pulls in the connotations the speaker wishes to pull in (pointing out that the referent comes from a culture that's been here many centuries longer than the cultures of more recent immigrants), then it's a successful usage. The fact that you can't come up with any real-life examples where the term causes confusion, needing to create hypotheticals, is telling.

And in your example, the speaker should have rephrased his information: "I was in the US last month. I had dinner with a Ian and Dave to discuss the merger. Ian emigrated there five years ago. Dave was born there". It has the advantage of fewer syllables, parallel construction, and no ambiguity.

[Lemur866]

The thing is, the concept of "Indians" or "Native Americans", to refer to people descended from people who lived here before Columbus, is a European construct. The various tribes and empires who lived in the Americas before Columbus didn't have a term that meant "people who live in the Americas", because they didn't need to.

You have to be aware that there's another continent out there before you need a name for the particular continent you live on.

And when Indians came in contact with Europeans, they didn't have the idea that there were two types of people--Indians in one category, Europeans in another. Rather, Europeans were just one more type of people. Sure, they spoke different languages and dressed funny and had funny technology, but so did every other group that wasn't your group.

[Anne Neville]

You expect language usage to be logical and unambiguous? That's your problem, right there. That's like expecting golfers to follow the rules of basketball.

[DanBlather]

Originally Posted by Bernieyeball

I always get grief when I pose this question

How do you 'pose' it, do you put a little dress on it? Sheesh:

assume a posture as for artistic purposes; "We don't know the woman who posed for Leonardo so often" [syn: model, sit, posture]

Or maybe this:


Pretend to be someone you are not; sometimes with fraudulent intentions;

[Peremensoe]

This is Bernieyeball's second try at this. Many here are addressing a slightly larger question (the overall usefulness and accuracy of "Native American") than what he actually asked (about that term's incorporation of "American," which wasn't a pre-Columbian word).

Originally Posted by Bernieyeball

I suspect the humans who inhabited this continent before the arrival of Europeans did not call it North America or America.
How can they be Native "Americans"?

Originally Posted by spark240

In English, we call it America. "Native American" is an English-language term.

As it happens, the word for the continent in some Native languages is "America," or something close to it, simply because individual tribes had no basis for thinking in terms of the whole continent before European arrival.

In Cherokee Tsalagi, the word is Ameliga.

Before the European "discovery," there was no concept, for anyone, of a collective body including all the human populations indigenous to the American continents, but distinct from all human populations elsewhere. Therefore the only possible terms are retrofits. If you speak English, it makes sense to use an English retrofit term. "Indian" was the first such, but is obviously more susceptible to misunderstanding in most contexts.

Originally Posted by Marley23

Since you're discussing national origins I'd assume he was born in the U.S. (And if I'm wrong, so what?) I understand there are situations in which this could be confusing. There are two ways to read the phrase. But most of the time the meaning is clear. It's the same as the beef example.

If the speaker was concerned about the possibility of misunderstanding, he could say "Dave is an American by birth." Ian's "emigration" implies he has relocated permanently, and may become a citizen. But given the parallel presentation of the two, I would say it's easy to comprehend as a statement on each man's personal origins and relationship to the United States, not his ancestry.

Originally Posted by smiling bandit

They definitely weren't nations and they might not have been first.

They were nations.

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

A nation is a group of people who share culture, ethnic origin and language, often possessing or seeking its own independent government.

[smiling bandit]

Originally Posted by spark240

They were nations.

Errr... not so much, no. We're not entirely clear just how closely connected even nominally-similar tribes were ethnically. Lingually, some seem to have been divided. Culture was usually shared significantly with a tribe, but the tribes were also spread out and intermixed, and rarely had a significant government over them as a tribe.

I will grant that evidence is sparse and incomplete now, because many languages have vanished, records never created or gone, and peoples assimiilated. But there's evidence of two or three migrations now, not just one. Languages seem to have been substantially divergent over area, with little commercial contact between people of the same tribe, let alone neighboring ones.

[Lemur866]

Our notions of the systems of government in North America are skewed, because aside from early Spanish contact, European contact happened after the continent-wide pandemics. The Mississippi valley is full of earthworks from the Mound Builders, but by the time European settlers arrived the Mound Builder civilization was gone. These earthworks weren't constructed by a few scattered bands of hunter-gatherers. The Spanish famously encountered many state level civilizations during their conquests. The Pilgrims famously were taught how to farm by the Indians.

The vast majority of Indians in 1491 were farmers, not nomadic hunter-gatherers. State level social organization was common. Continent-wide trade networks existed, although we see interesting things, like tobacco paraphernalia showing up in Alaska in the 1600s--apparently tobacco was introduced from the Americas to Europe, and across Eurasia to Siberia, and showed up in Alaska the long way round.

[BrightNShiny]

Or, to sum up, you're entire argument is: I'm going to make up stuff and people who don't agree with me are stupid cretins. Big deal. It's not a persuasive argument, but have fun trying to convince yourself that it is.

[tomndebb]

TWEEET!

The next post that continues the bickering over who should be able to say what or whether or not another poster is "worked up" will receive a Warning for hijacking the thread.

Address the specific issue of the OP, or take it to the BBQ Pit.

[ /Moderating ]

[A Dodgy Dude]

Anybody born on American soil is a "native American."

The people who were here before the pilgrims arrived are "American Indians."

[BrightNShiny]

Oh, and yes, I do realize that I incorrectly used the word "you're" in my previous posts. I missed the edit window.

[Clothahump]

Originally Posted by Bernieyeball

I always get grief when I pose this question but I think it is a reasonable inquiry.
I suspect the humans who inhabited this continent before the arrival of Europeans did not call it North America or America.
How can they be Native "Americans"?

Especially since they came across the Bering land bridge and migrated southwards.

OMFG!!!! They were illegal immigrants!!!!

[The Flying Dutchman]

Originally Posted by Clothahump

Especially since they came across the Bering land bridge and migrated southwards.

OMFG!!!! They were illegal immigrants!!!!

You think thats funny ? Let me tell you that the incursion of non aboriginals into the Americas hasn't exactly worked out for the aboriginals. Every immigrant (and I'm an immigrant) simply has a netgative impact on their quality of life that they would have had without us Europeans. Or Asians Or the Africans for that matter, who were willing enough to work as slaves for the whites and thereby justifierd their existence in the new world.

[BrightNShiny]

I have provided an argument. It just keeps being hand-waved away. It is a fact that the term "native" has multiple definitions. It is a fact that the term "America" applies not only to the country called the United States, but also to the continent which it rests on. Those are statement of facts. It is a fact that a proposed etymology has been made in this thread, but nobody has provided any evidence of the proposed etymology.

Simply repeating over and over that one's preferred usage is the majority usage is nothing more than a statement of belief. Calling something a "distraction" is not an argument, it is a statement of personal preference.

[qpw3141]

Originally Posted by BrightNShiny

I have provided an argument. It just keeps being hand-waved away. It is a fact that the term "native" has multiple definitions. It is a fact that the term "America" applies not only to the country called the United States, but also to the continent which it rests on. Those are statement of facts. It is a fact that a proposed etymology has been made in this thread, but nobody has provided any evidence of the proposed etymology.

Simply repeating over and over that one's preferred usage is the majority usage is nothing more than a statement of belief. Calling something a "distraction" is not an argument, it is a statement of personal preference.

It isn't 'hand waved' away.

It's just irrelevant.

Native may have more than one definition. That's not the point.

It's the construction: "Native <place>er/ian" that has one constructed meaning for every single value of <place> except America that leads to the assertion that 'Native American' is irregular.

Note, if this is what's worrying you, that 'irregular' in no way implies 'wrong'.

[BrightNShiny]

Originally Posted by qpw3141

It isn't 'hand waved' away.

It's just irrelevant.

This is the definition of hand-waving. If your only response to an argument is to declare it irrelevant, then it's clear that you have no counter-argument.

Native may have more than one definition. That's not the point.

It's the construction: "Native <place>er/ian" that has one constructed meaning for every single value of <place> except America that leads to the assertion that 'Native American' is irregular.

Again, this statement is false. It is not the only time that native is used in this sense. For example, the term "Native Australian" can be used as a synonym for Aborigine. See here and here. Of course, I can predict the response, which will be that since you personally don't use the term "Native Australian" that must mean that the term is irrelevant.

Note, if this is what's worrying you, that 'irregular' in no way implies 'wrong'.

I'm not the one who doesn't understand the term "irregular." Of course, this is just another repeated attempt at "distraction."

[BrightNShiny]

Other usages of the term "Native":

Native Fijian: Referring to the native (that is, Melanesian) population of Fiji (see here for examples usages).

Native Hawaiian: Referring to the native (that is, Polynesian) population of Hawaii (see here for example usages).

There is nothing irregular about this construction. It is commonly found in English.

[BrightNShiny]

Even more usages:

Native Peruvian: Referring to the indigenous people of Peru (that is, Incan, etc.). See here for example usage.

Native Siberian: Referring to the non-Eastern European population of Siberia. See here for example usage.

Native Samoan: Referring to the native (that is, Polynesian) population of Samoa. See here for example usage.

[Polycarp]

"Native" in ethnological usage generally refers to the inhabitants present when their home region was "discovered" by Europeans, AFAIK regardless of whether they were in fact the first colonizers of the region or in fact replaced preceding peoples. American Indians are Native Americans in the same way as Malays are Native Indonesians, Khoikhoi Native South Africans, etc.

I might point out that, since no pre-Columbian language evolved a term that distinguishes the speakers of that language and their neighbors throughout the Americas from (to them hypothetical) other human beings, we are stuck with two English phrases, American (or Red) Indians (the alternative a Britticism) and Native Americans, or the neologism portmanteaued from the first, Amerind(s). Though an obvious coinage from American Indian, it does have the virtue of being non-ambiguous and non-pejorative.

[BrightNShiny]

Native Andamanese: Referring to the aboriginal inhabitants of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. See here and here for example usage.

[BrightNShiny]

Native Oaxacan: Ok, I just like saying Oaxaca. But see here for example usage.

[bdgr]

I prefer to be called "wagon burner" myself, but that's just me.