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Indigenous vs Ethnic - What's the difference?

indigenous | ethnic |

As adjectives the difference between ethnic and indigenous

is that ethnic is of or relating to a group of people having common racial, national, religious or cultural origins while indigenous is born or engendered in, native to a land or region, especially before an intrusion.

As a noun ethnic

is an ethnic person, notably said when a foreigner or member of an immigrant community.

indigenous

English

Adjective

(-)
  • (chiefly, of living things) Born or engendered in, native to a land or region, especially before an intrusion.
  • * 1862 , , "Wild Apples: The History of the Apple Tree":
    • Not only the Indian, but many indigenous insects, birds, and quadrupeds, welcomed the apple-tree to these shores.
  • Innate, inborn.
  • * 1852 , , Uncle Tom's Cabin , ch. 18:
    • She was a native and essential cook, as much as Aunt Chloe,—cooking being an indigenous talent of the African race.
  • * 1883 , , "Stephen Archer" in Stephen Archer and Other Tales :
    • He had all the tricks of a newspaper boy indigenous in him.

    Synonyms

    * (born or engendered in) aboriginal, autochthonous, native

    Derived terms

    * indigenity * indigenously * indigenousness * nonindigenous

    ethnic

    English

    Alternative forms

    * ethnick (obsolete)

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Of or relating to a group of people having common racial, national, religious or cultural origins.
    • There are many ethnic Indonesians in the Netherlands
  • Belonging to a foreign culture.
    • I like to eat ethnic food
  • (historical) Heathen, not Judeo-Christian-Muslim.

    • Derived terms

    * antiethnic * ethnic cleansing * ethnic group * ethnic minority

    Related terms

    * ethnicity * ethnically * ethnical * ethnicity * ethnocentric * ethnocultural * ethnography * ethnologeny * ethnology

    Synonyms

    * (culturally foreign) exotic * (heathen) pagan, gentile

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An ethnic person, notably said when a foreigner or member of an immigrant community.
  • An ethnic minority. (rfex)
  • (archaic) A heathen, a pagan.
  • *
    • ..for the learned know that even in St. Jerome's time, the consul of Rome and his wife were both Ethnics , and about the same time the greatest part of the senate also...
  • * 1641 . .
    • ...And the people of God, redeemed and washed with Christ's blood, and dignified with so many glorious titles of saints and sons in the Gospel, are now no better reputed than impure ethnics and lay dogs...
  • (in classical scholarship ) the demonym of an Ancient Greek city
  • * 2006 . Cohen. The Hellenistic Settlements in Syria, the Red Sea Basin & North Africa , 151.
    • "Coinage with the ethnic ????????? ???? ???????? survives from the mid-second century A.D."

    External links

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