I'm going to anger some people but here I go anyway. I don't like being called indigenous just call me native american.

Indigenous makes me sound primitive. I am NOT primitive. But hey aren't you mixed? Yes I'm only half native and the rest of me mexican but still I am not primitive. Making me sound like I'm some lesser type of human and what not.

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ArishMell · 70-79, M

Neither word itself is derogatory. If used in a derogatory manner that is a matter of the speaker's atitudes, often based on ignorance including no appreciation of etymology.

Indigenous refers to one's ancestral land of birth. I am indigenous to, i.e. a native of, England but that makes me no more or less human than anyone indigenous to Northen England, Scotland, Scandinavia or Australia.

Primitive is frequently misused but is really only chronological, not a descriptor of "quality". It uses the same root as prime or primary, meaning first.