Ethnonym

An Ethnonym is the name used for an ethnic group, tribe, nationality, or people. A name that is either a tribes own name — a name used by the people themselves to refer to themselves — or by outsiders to refer to a people.

There are two types of ethnonym. An ethnonym can be either an

• Endonym — the name used by the people to refer to themselves, or an
• Exonym — the name used by outsiders to refer to a people.

For example, the Europeans referred to the natives as “Indians” when they arrived to the Americas (allegedly under the impression that they had arrived to India, and that these were Indians). This is an exonym.

The people of the Americas had names for themselves. For example, the Aztecs with whom the Europeans first made contact, called themselves the Mexica, Culhua-Mexica, and Tenochca. The term Aztec was invented much later by historians, in honour of their mythical homeland Aztlan.

In addition, the German people of Germany are known by English speaking peoples as the “German people”. This is an ethnonym, specifically an exonym, because the German people call themselves the Deutsche and their country Deutschland, in their own tongue.

Likewise, the Japanese people are known as Japanese by English speakers, and their country as Japan. However, they call themselves 日本人 (にほんじん, nihonjin) which is literally “Japan person” — which is an endonym — and refer to their country as 日本 which can be pronounced as nihon or nippon (にほん or にっぽん).