NATIVE AMERICAN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does Native American mean? 

• NATIVE AMERICAN (noun)
  The noun NATIVE AMERICAN has 1 sense:

1. any member of the peoples living in North or South America before the Europeans arrived

  Familiarity information: NATIVE AMERICAN used as a noun is very rare.

• NATIVE AMERICAN (adjective)
  The adjective NATIVE AMERICAN has 1 sense:

1. of or pertaining to Native Americans or their culture or languages

  Familiarity information: NATIVE AMERICAN used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• NATIVE AMERICAN (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Any member of the peoples living in North or South America before the Europeans arrived

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

Amerindian; Native American

Hypernyms ("Native American" is a kind of...):

person of color; person of colour ((formal) any non-European non-white person)

individual; mortal; person; somebody; someone; soul (a human being)

Domain member category:

war party (a band of warriors who raid or fight an enemy (used especially of Native Americans))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "Native American"):

Penutian (a member of a North American Indian people speaking one of the Penutian languages)

squaw (derogatory terms for an American Indian woman)

sannup (a married male American Indian)

Paleo-American; Paleo-Amerind; Paleo-Indian (a member of the Paleo-American peoples who were the earliest human inhabitants of North America and South America during the late Pleistocene epoch)

Eskimo; Esquimau; Inuit (a member of a people inhabiting the Arctic (northern Canada or Greenland or Alaska or eastern Siberia); the Algonquians called them Eskimo ('eaters of raw flesh') but they call themselves the Inuit ('the people'))

Arawak; Arawakan (a member of a widespread group of Amerindians living in northeastern South America)

Aleut; Aleutian (a member of the people inhabiting the Aleutian Islands and southwestern Alaska)

Carib; Carib Indian (a member of an American Indian peoples of northeastern South America and the Lesser Antilles)

South American Indian (a member of a native Indian group in South America)

Wakashan (a member of one of the peoples in British Columbia and Washington who speak the Wakashan language)

Tlingit (a member of a seafaring group of North American Indians living in southern Alaska)

Shoshone; Shoshoni (a member of the North American Indian people (related to the Aztecs) of the southwestern United States)

Salish (a member of a group of North American Indians speaking a Salishan language and living on the northwest coast of North America)

Injun; red man; Redskin ((slang) offensive term for Native Americans)

Pueblo (a member of any of about two dozen Native American peoples called 'Pueblos' by the Spanish because they live in pueblos (villages built of adobe and rock))

Algonquian; Algonquin (a member of any of the North American Indian groups speaking an Algonquian language and originally living in the subarctic regions of eastern Canada; many Algonquian tribes migrated south into the woodlands from the Mississippi River to the Atlantic coast)

Muskhogean; Muskogean (a member of any of the peoples formerly living in southeastern United States and speaking Muskhogean languages)

Iroquois (any member of the warlike North American Indian peoples formerly living in New York State; the Iroquois League were allies of the British during the American Revolution)

Hoka; Hokan (a member of a North American Indian people speaking one of the Hokan languages)

Haida (a member of a seafaring group of North American Indians who lived on the Pacific coast of British Columbia and southwestern Alaska)

Creek (any member of the Creek Confederacy (especially the Muskogee) formerly living in Georgia and Alabama but now chiefly in Oklahoma)

Coeur d'Alene (a member of an Amerindian people living in northern Idaho around Coeur d'Alene Lake)

Chickasaw (a member of the Muskhogean people formerly living in northern Mississippi)

Buffalo Indian; Plains Indian (a member of one of the tribes of American Indians who lived a nomadic life following the buffalo in the Great Plains of North America)

Zapotec; Zapotecan (a member of a large tribe of Mesoamericans living in southern Mexico whose civilization flourished around 300 to 900)

Olmec (a member of an early Mesoamerican civilization centered around Veracruz that flourished between 1300 and 400 BC)

Nahuatl (a member of any of various Indian peoples of central Mexico)

Maya; Mayan (a member of an American Indian people of Yucatan and Belize and Guatemala who had a culture (which reached its peak between AD 300 and 900) characterized by outstanding architecture and pottery and astronomy)

Athabascan; Athabaskan; Athapascan; Athapaskan (a member of any of the North American Indian groups speaking an Athapaskan language and living in the subarctic regions of western Canada and central Alaska)

Anasazi (a Native American who lived in what is now southern Colorado and Utah and northern Arizona and New Mexico and who built cliff dwellings)

• NATIVE AMERICAN (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Of or pertaining to Native Americans or their culture or languages

Classified under:

Relational adjectives (pertainyms)

Synonyms:

Amerind; Amerindic; Indian; Native American

Context example:

Indian arrowheads

Pertainym:

Native American (any member of the peoples living in North or South America before the Europeans arrived)

 Context examples 

It is more common in women and Native Americans.

(Gallbladder Cancer, NIH: National Cancer Institute)

Prevalence is highest among Asians, Native Americans and Africans.

(Lactose Intolerance, NCI Thesaurus)

The remains are genetically very close to the ancestors of Paleo-Siberian speakers and close to the ancestors of Native Americans.

(DNA from 31,000-year-old milk teeth leads to discovery of new group of ancient Siberians, University of Cambridge)

A legal battle over a 10,600-year-old ancient skeleton – called the ‘Spirit Cave Mummy’ – has ended after advanced DNA sequencing found it was related to a Native American tribe.

(Ancient DNA analysis unlocks secrets of Ice Age tribes in the Americas, University of Cambridge)

It occurs with increased frequency in Asians and Native Americans.

(EBV-Positive T-Cell Lymphoproliferative Disorder of Childhood, NCI Thesaurus)

Gallstones are most common among older adults, women, overweight people, Native Americans and Mexican Americans.

(Gallstones, NIH: National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases)

It was initially described among Native Americans belonging to the Haliwa-Saponi tribe of northeastern North Carolina.

(Hereditary Benign Intraepithelial Dyskeratosis, NCI Thesaurus)

A Native American (NA) is a person having origins in one of the indigenous peoples of North America, who lived on the continent prior to the European colonization.

(Native American, NCI Thesaurus)

Lupus is also more common in African American, Hispanic, Asian and Native American women.

(Lupus, NIH: National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases)

AIDS related research with a minimum of 20% (or $100,000) relevance to individuals who are Asian/Pacific Islanders or Native Americans, including American Indians, Alaskan Natives, and Hawaiian Natives.

(AIDS, Other Minorities, NCI Thesaurus)