Why did Europeans continue to call native Americans "Indians"?

It's definitely misleading, which is probably the main reason it's dying out in Canada. It's not offensive though. I mean Natives have been able to control the definition so that groups they see as especially separate (the Inuit, possibly others) were not labelled as part of their group. The people of the Indian subcontinent seem to have likewise managed to craft the European definition to more closely align with their own.


I'm also not sold on the idea that India has massively more diversity than Europe or the natives of the Americas. I would suspect that being a reasonably similar subcontinent type affair that Europe and India probably have similar diversity, while the dozens of language families present in the Americas shows a much higher diversity there than in the other two.
 
It is not a question of being offensive to the native Americans, but to the "real" Indians, ie. the people from India. It is confusing as well. But, if the native Americans prefer the term "Indian" over other terms, I think they might be allowed to keep that name. But to avoid confusion an adjective may be added, like say 'Amerindian'. Though inside India proper other names like Bharat or Hindustan are used for the country, in foreign countries in Europe or Americas, the name "India", being familiar cannot be easily replaced. Hence the requirement of a term like "Amerindian", for the native people of the Americas.

Well in regards to India things were just as inaccurate. Turn of the 1900's immigrants from the place in California were called Hindus, even though most of them were Sikh.
 

SinghKing

Banned
I'm also not sold on the idea that India has massively more diversity than Europe or the natives of the Americas. I would suspect that being a reasonably similar subcontinent type affair that Europe and India probably have similar diversity, while the dozens of language families present in the Americas shows a much higher diversity there than in the other two.

According to the UN, India has more than 2000 ethnic groups, and every major religion is represented, as are four major families of languages (Indo-European, Dravidian, Austroasiatic and Sino-Tibetan languages) as well as two language isolates (the Nihali language spoken in parts of Maharashtra and the Burushaski language spoken in parts of Jammu and Kashmir). Further complexity is lent by the great variation that occurs across this population on social parameters such as income and education. Only the entire continent of Africa exceeds the linguistic, genetic and cultural diversity of the nation of India (which is greater than the rest of Asia combined).

For comparison, Europe only has 87 ethnic groups, of which 33 form the majority population in at least one sovereign state, while the remaining 54 constitute ethnic minorities. As for the Americas; well, it's virtually impossible to find a reliable estimate for the number of (indigenous) extant American ethnic groups, precisely because of the all-encompassing nature of the imposed blanket term, 'Indians'. However, we can ascertain their relative linguistic diversity; across the entirety of the Americas, there are estimated to be a total of around 993 extant native languages. Whereas India has a total of 1721 extant native languages (and Europe only has a meagre 234 extant native languages). Draw your own conclusions...
 
According to the UN, India has more than 2000 ethnic groups, and every major religion is represented, as are four major families of languages (Indo-European, Dravidian, Austroasiatic and Sino-Tibetan languages) as well as two language isolates (the Nihali language spoken in parts of Maharashtra and the Burushaski language spoken in parts of Jammu and Kashmir). Further complexity is lent by the great variation that occurs across this population on social parameters such as income and education. Only the entire continent of Africa exceeds the linguistic, genetic and cultural diversity of the nation of India (which is greater than the rest of Asia combined).

For comparison, Europe only has 87 ethnic groups, of which 33 form the majority population in at least one sovereign state, while the remaining 54 constitute ethnic minorities. As for the Americas; well, it's virtually impossible to find a reliable estimate for the number of (indigenous) extant American ethnic groups, precisely because of the all-encompassing nature of the imposed blanket term, 'Indians'. However, we can ascertain their relative linguistic diversity; across the entirety of the Americas, there are estimated to be a total of around 993 extant native languages. Whereas India has a total of 1721 extant native languages (and Europe only has a meagre 234 extant native languages). Draw your own conclusions...

Languages really aren't a good measure. Defining languages is a very difficult thing to do, you get many cases off effectively mutually intelligible groups declaring their languages different, while language continuums that have non-mutually intelligible groups are different ends declaring themselves to be the same language.

Ethnicities are a similarly controversial dividing point, different regions of the world have different definitions.

Language Families seem to be the only level that isn't highly politicised.
 
I dunno; I think your Eurocentric mindset makes you believe Europe is more diverse than other areas of the world (I don't necessarily blame you- people see more differences between people they see every day).
 
I dunno; I think your Eurocentric mindset makes you believe Europe is more diverse than other areas of the world (I don't necessarily blame you- people see more differences between people they see every day).
I'm mostly arguing about Native diversity being under played. I know India is diverse, but I do think there's serious issues on the definition of many things. I honestly wonder how many of those ethnic groups were European creations as the British promoted a case of divide and conquer, much like how the two main ethnic groups involved with the Rwanda genocide were both made up by the Belgians as a tool for control. The British had some very weird ideas about dividing people up.
 
It's true that Native American is a very USian term. In much of Latin America, Indigneda is a preferred term. Indio is a very pejorative term. In Anglo-America Native is the general term we use amongst ourselves, especially in Canada where it's much more aware outside of the Native community. And speaking of Canada, First Nations is closer to Native American; looks good in academic and official stuff, but more on the clumsy side in everyday speech. Indian, especially in the States, doesn't carry the same negative implications as Indio does with most Natives, but it's not really preferred term in most circles.

For me and most people in my circles, I can usually tell how much they know depending on the term they use. If they call us Indians, it usually means they don't shit about us. For Native American or First Nations, it usually tells me they are at least educated about racial issues, but in a more academic way, and are more than likely at least sympathetic. And if they actually just say Native, to me that's code they're probably down with us, and at least have actually worked with our communities if not just a friend or more. As for Idigneda, the only people that aren't actually Native in Latin America (and in the cultural sense of belonging to an indigenous community, speaking the language and all that, not biologically like Mestizos/Ladinos) that I have ever heard use it were professors and allied activists.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Knew someone in grad school who was of Potwattomi

Had a fellow student in grad school who was of Potwattomi ancestry, from Indiana...he joked about being an Indianan Indian...

He and I had this discussion once, when we were in a course together; his basic take was "descendents of the native cultures of the Western Hemisphere who are not of Inuit ancestry" was a little bit of a mouthful.:)

As others have said, the issue with "dine" and the other anglicized versions of native language names is they tend to refer almost exclusively to those of a single cultural/tribal/societal grouping. The AIM, which was, back in the day, about as radical as any civil rights-focused group within the American (US) population gets, adopted the American Indian phrase quite consciously, and has retained it.

He said whenever he visited family at home, the response was always very limited and focused to his family/friends, but when he went into town to a bar, with his friends and someobody raised the issue, the basic response was "I'ma ind-yen - wanna make sumtin of it?"

When he was in the Army, before college, it was "I'ma 11Bravo - wanna make sumtin of it?"

When he was overseas in the Army, of course, it was "I'ma 'merrican - wanna make sumtin of it"?

We all have our tribes - some are self-selected, some are not. But they are still ours. Human nature.;)

And inertia has a lot to do with identification, internally and externally.

Best,
 
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Why is it that the Inuits are normally considered separate from all other native Americans? I would have thought that it would have been more difference between a Canadian Amerindian and one from Amazonas than between an Inuit and a Canadian Amerindian (but I must admit that my knowledge here is limited).
 

SinghKing

Banned
I'm mostly arguing about Native diversity being under played. I know India is diverse, but I do think there's serious issues on the definition of many things. I honestly wonder how many of those ethnic groups were European creations as the British promoted a case of divide and conquer, much like how the two main ethnic groups involved with the Rwanda genocide were both made up by the Belgians as a tool for control. The British had some very weird ideas about dividing people up.

Thing is, with the Indians (of the Indian sub-continent), those ethnic groups weren't British creations at all. They were just the culmination of thousands of years of self-imposed ethnic and cultural segregation, which historically separated communities into thousands of endogamous hereditary groups called jātis (or, by the modern definition, ethnicities). So, that's something which you can't really blame the colonialists for (although you can blame the British for socially stratifying Indian society on the basis of caste).

Really, if you look at the historical nature of Indian society, it's only logical for India's native population to have become the most ethnically diverse of any nation on earth- especially when you take the vast population of the Indian sub-continent into account, which exceeds the total populations of the Americas and Europe combined. On a per-capita basis, there are plenty of other nations on Earth which are more ethnically (and linguistically) diverse than India; indeed India's only 17th on the list of nations by ethnic diversity per capita (between Somalia and Nigeria). Perhaps unsurprisingly, the nation which tops the rankings on a per-capita basis is Papua New Guinea (and interestingly enough, PNG and India are the only two non-African nations in the top 20).
 
Why is it that the Inuits are normally considered separate from all other native Americans? I would have thought that it would have been more difference between a Canadian Amerindian and one from Amazonas than between an Inuit and a Canadian Amerindian (but I must admit that my knowledge here is limited).
I'm assuming it's because they wear heavy fur coats- so they tend to be compared more often to native Siberians?
 
It is not a question of being offensive to the native Americans, but to the "real" Indians, ie. the people from India. It is confusing as well. But, if the native Americans prefer the term "Indian" over other terms, I think they might be allowed to keep that name. But to avoid confusion an adjective may be added, like say 'Amerindian'. Though inside India proper other names like Bharat or Hindustan are used for the country, in foreign countries in Europe or Americas, the name "India", being familiar cannot be easily replaced. Hence the requirement of a term like "Amerindian", for the native people of the Americas.

To be totally honest, I never thought that the term "Indian" for the indigenous inhabitants of the New World might be offensive to people from India...I can understand why it might be, but I actually wonder of this is really offensive to most people in India. No doubt it is inaccurate. But that is the nature of language, which is not logical. I am a citizen of the United States of largely German and English extraction. At various times and in depending on the context, I can be called "American", "European", "German", "English", and lots of other things depending on where I've lived or identify with. And these are all accurate terms in the context they are used. In the context of the United States, "Indian" is to most people an accepted, if possibly not the ideal, term for Native people.
 
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I'm assuming it's because they wear heavy fur coats- so they tend to be compared more often to native Siberians?

Because, based on oral traditions, physiognomy, cultural similarities with other circumpolar people, and genetics, Inuits are believed to have migrated to the New World fairly recently, far later than the ancestors of modern American Indians. To state it simply, Inuits are a different people.
 
I'd think about the only way it would change is if the USA had given itself a different name, and didn't refer to themselves as Americans. Then, the term could be applied to Native Americans, just like Europeans, Asians, etc....

Good idea, but part of the problem is that well-before independence the name "American" was given to us not only by ourselves, but by contemporary Britons, Frenchmen, and most other European powers American colonists dealt with. My guess is that even if we chose to call our new country something like "The Continental Union", most people would call us "Americans" because that's where we are from in their eyes, in much the same way most people outside of the old USSR called everyone from that country "Russians."
 
Thing is, with the Indians (of the Indian sub-continent), those ethnic groups weren't British creations at all. They were just the culmination of thousands of years of self-imposed ethnic and cultural segregation, which historically separated communities into thousands of endogamous hereditary groups called jātis (or, by the modern definition, ethnicities). So, that's something which you can't really blame the colonialists for (although you can blame the British for socially stratifying Indian society on the basis of caste).

Really, if you look at the historical nature of Indian society, it's only logical for India's native population to have become the most ethnically diverse of any nation on earth- especially when you take the vast population of the Indian sub-continent into account, which exceeds the total populations of the Americas and Europe combined. On a per-capita basis, there are plenty of other nations on Earth which are more ethnically (and linguistically) diverse than India; indeed India's only 17th on the list of nations by ethnic diversity per capita (between Somalia and Nigeria). Perhaps unsurprisingly, the nation which tops the rankings on a per-capita basis is Papua New Guinea (and interestingly enough, PNG and India are the only two non-African nations in the top 20).

Somalia? Aren't they like the most ethnically homogeneous nation in Africa, being almost totally Somali? There's subgroups and clans, but they're still Somali.

I think that lends serious weight to the idea of ethnicity having different definitions in different places. I mean heck, the existence of Canadian and American as ethnicities is odd (and Canada has a few hundred people who write Texan for their ethnicity).

I would like to say that I think a lot of people understate India's diversity and overstate Europe's, but as Europe and India have a similar over all size, similar amounts of geographic barriers, and historically a similar population (the 20th century has seen India fall into a demographic trap while Europe saw birth rates decline), I figure actual diversity is probably similar. Europeans just wanted to clump their groups together as a side effect of nationalism while the translations of identity groups of India may have been a bit off. Unlike what Mr. Sanchez says the groupings of humanity often have very different hierarchies that don't line up perfectly.
 
Thing is, with the Indians (of the Indian sub-continent), those ethnic groups weren't British creations at all. They were just the culmination of thousands of years of self-imposed ethnic and cultural segregation, which historically separated communities into thousands of endogamous hereditary groups called jātis (or, by the modern definition, ethnicities). So, that's something which you can't really blame the colonialists for (although you can blame the British for socially stratifying Indian society on the basis of caste).

Really, if you look at the historical nature of Indian society, it's only logical for India's native population to have become the most ethnically diverse of any nation on earth- especially when you take the vast population of the Indian sub-continent into account, which exceeds the total populations of the Americas and Europe combined. On a per-capita basis, there are plenty of other nations on Earth which are more ethnically (and linguistically) diverse than India; indeed India's only 17th on the list of nations by ethnic diversity per capita (between Somalia and Nigeria). Perhaps unsurprisingly, the nation which tops the rankings on a per-capita basis is Papua New Guinea (and interestingly enough, PNG and India are the only two non-African nations in the top 20).

I do not understand what prompts SinghKing to consider each caste as an ethnic group. Well, you need not accept the official stand that there is only one ethnicity ie. Indian. Still 2000 ethnic groups is an exaggeration.

It is like the number of gods in Hinduism, which many claim to be 330 millions! Actually the number of Vedic gods were 33 and later number of zeroes were added to it just for the sake of exaggeration! I have read in certain history books that there are seven ethnic groups in India. As ethnicity is not easy to be defined it is difficult to get a definite answer.

Same is the case with languages. There may be seventy or eighty languages counting the minor ones. But if you go on counting all dialects, slangs and minor local variations you can stretch that number to several hundreds or thousands. Among them you can count at least two three dozen "local English" languages too!

There is a tendency to exaggerate the diversities in India. Of course there are diversities in ethnicity, language, cultures, religions etc. But there is no point in counting every item in hundreds and thousands for the sake of exaggeration.
 

SinghKing

Banned
Somalia? Aren't they like the most ethnically homogeneous nation in Africa, being almost totally Somali? There's subgroups and clans, but they're still Somali.

I think that lends serious weight to the idea of ethnicity having different definitions in different places. I mean heck, the existence of Canadian and American as ethnicities is odd (and Canada has a few hundred people who write Texan for their ethnicity).

Not really. True, Somalia is around 85% Somali; but you might as well say that Yugoslavia was the most ethnically homogenous nation in Europe because it was almost totally Slavic. That there were subgroups and clans- Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, Solvenes- but they were still Slavic.

Genetically, molecular anthropology provides a stronger scientific basis for the classification of the Somali 'subgroups and clans' as distinct and separate ethnic groups than it does for the classification of the Slavic subgroups (West Slavics, East Slavics and South Slavics) and clans (Russians, Poles, Ukranians, Serbs etc) as distinct and separate ethnic groups.

I would like to say that I think a lot of people understate India's diversity and overstate Europe's, but as Europe and India have a similar over all size, similar amounts of geographic barriers, and historically a similar population (the 20th century has seen India fall into a demographic trap while Europe saw birth rates decline), I figure actual diversity is probably similar. Europeans just wanted to clump their groups together as a side effect of nationalism while the translations of identity groups of India may have been a bit off. Unlike what Mr. Sanchez says the groupings of humanity often have very different hierarchies that don't line up perfectly.

Well, that would be completely contrary to all of the evidence. Similar overall size? The Indian sub-continent is less than half the size of the European subcontinent. Similar geographic barriers? What are the European equivalents to the Himalayas, to the Indian great rivers, the Indian deserts and jungles? And a similar historical population? Seriously? India's population remained largely stagnant, fluctuating around an average of 100M for almost 2000 years, between 300 BCE and 1600 CE. At the start of this period, in 300BCE, Europe's population was only estimated to stand at 20M; it reached 70M before being halved by the Black Death, and only finally reached a par with India's population i.r.o 1700 CE.

When you're talking about the basis for the formation of distinct 'ethnicities', then you have to realize that the argument which you seem to be trying to make here- that the POD which led to this outcome of greater diversity must have only come in the (late) 20th century, when the Indian subcontinent overtook Europe to become the more populous of the two again- is completely ASB.
 
Not really. True, Somalia is around 85% Somali; but you might as well say that Yugoslavia was the most ethnically homogenous nation in Europe because it was almost totally Slavic. That there were subgroups and clans- Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, Solvenes- but they were still Slavic.

Genetically, molecular anthropology provides a stronger scientific basis for the classification of the Somali 'subgroups and clans' as distinct and separate ethnic groups than it does for the classification of the Slavic subgroups (West Slavics, East Slavics and South Slavics) and clans (Russians, Poles, Ukranians, Serbs etc) as distinct and separate ethnic groups.
African genetic diversity absolutely outweighs any where. Cultural diversity is different though. Somalis have three main language/dialects and as far as I can tell two of them are reasonably mutually intelligible. Either way, Yugoslavia's biggest issues were religious, and as far as I can tell religion is one front Somalia is very homogenous. If it weren't for their religious differences most Europeans would probably consider Bosnians, Serbs, and Croats as one ethnicity.

Well, that would be completely contrary to all of the evidence. Similar overall size? The Indian sub-continent is less than half the size of the European subcontinent. Similar geographic barriers? What are the European equivalents to the Himalayas, to the Indian great rivers, the Indian deserts and jungles? And a similar historical population? Seriously? India's population remained largely stagnant, fluctuating around an average of 100M for almost 2000 years, between 300 BCE and 1600 CE. At the start of this period, in 300BCE, Europe's population was only estimated to stand at 20M; it reached 70M before being halved by the Black Death, and only finally reached a par with India's population i.r.o 1700 CE.
While there's only limited sources for pre-1500 numbers what I can find seems to show Europe wasn't that far behind India for population. Biggest gap I could find was a bit over double at one point, but that was basically before almost any of Europe's modern ethnic groups existed (and probably similar for India).
For land area, Europe has a lot of cold low density areas, so for discussing viable populated size they aren't too different. As for divisions, Europe has the Alps and a number of other mountain ranges running through the middle, along with being divided with numerous islands and peninsulas. Historically there were also vast forests. There's a number of major river systems. As for Europe's equivalent of the Himalayas, I suppose that would be the Atlantic Ocean, as both for the edge of the region in question. So, I suppose in the end Europe has fewer people, but more geographic divisions over a somewhat larger area, which seems like it should cause more diversity due to greater isolation.

When you're talking about the basis for the formation of distinct 'ethnicities', then you have to realize that the argument which you seem to be trying to make here- that the POD which led to this outcome of greater diversity must have only come in the (late) 20th century, when the Indian subcontinent overtook Europe to become the more populous of the two again- is completely ASB.
Pardon? That's not what I was saying at all.:confused:
 

SinghKing

Banned
I do not understand what prompts SinghKing to consider each caste as an ethnic group. Well, you need not accept the official stand that there is only one ethnicity ie. Indian. Still 2000 ethnic groups is an exaggeration.

It is like the number of gods in Hinduism, which many claim to be 330 millions! Actually the number of Vedic gods were 33 and later number of zeroes were added to it just for the sake of exaggeration! I have read in certain history books that there are seven ethnic groups in India. As ethnicity is not easy to be defined it is difficult to get a definite answer.

Same is the case with languages. There may be seventy or eighty languages counting the minor ones. But if you go on counting all dialects, slangs and minor local variations you can stretch that number to several hundreds or thousands. Among them you can count at least two three dozen "local English" languages too!

There is a tendency to exaggerate the diversities in India. Of course there are diversities in ethnicity, language, cultures, religions etc. But there is no point in counting every item in hundreds and thousands for the sake of exaggeration.

I don't consider each caste to be a separate ethnic group. But I do consider the jātis to be a legitimate basis for the later formation of India's vast plethora of ethnic groups, built around these historical subdivisions between different populations. Why is this any less legitimate than the view that historical European tribes were a legitimate basis for the later formation of Europe's various ethnic groups, built around the historical subdivision between their different populations?

I have read in several history books that the Basque are actually the only extant ethnic group native to Europe; all of the others (Indo-Aryan, Turkic, Finno-Ugric, Northern Caucasian, Kartvelian, Semitic and Mongolic) are invasive ethnic groups from Asia and the Middle East. Does that make all non-Basque 'European' ethnic groups illegitimate? And as for the language criticism, I'm going on the basis of mutual intelligibility being the primary criterion which separates languages from dialects.

In Europe, there are 234 extant languages; if we were to extant the same lax criteria of 'mutual intelligibility' which we use to define Amerindian languages (such as Quechua, Mayan and Aymara) from their respective 'dialects', then this would be whittled down to only 16 extant European languages- 9, excluding those 7 extant languages of which aren't actually European in origin. The only extant European languages by this token would Slavic, Romance, Germanic, Celtic, Greek, Baltic, Albanian, Armenian and Basque. Would this seem fair to you?
 
I don't see why two words terms are so difficult - one word for your racial origin and one word for your nationality. Why not just class different racial groups as African American, European American, Native American, Asian American etc?
 
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