Quote Originally Posted by Antono
Евгения, the Indians in the USA are called native Americans. The governmentt has an own office dealing with them, it's called "Bureau for Indian Affairs", if I remember correctly.
That's funny. If they are not "Indians", why is the agency called Bureau of Indian Affairs?

Well I'll tell ya. Because that is their name and has been so since Christopher Columbus mistakenly thought he was in the Indies when he landed in the new world. Recently, certain groups of do gooders have tried to get people to stop using the word "Indians" and use "Native Americans" instead. Well the problem for them is that most Indians don't want another "name" because they like the one they have been using. I have lived and worked with many Indians over the years and have never heard them call each other Native Americans yet. And whats more, if I were to meet an Indian and refer to him or her as a Native American, I am sure they would only thnk that I was trying to "suck up" to them in some fashion. And God forbid if I had to work with them every day after that, the jokes about me would never end. I don't know any Politicaly Correct Indians.
The term Native American applies to any person born in America. For you are native to where you are born. This, the early Americans knew. In their time those who had not come from England but had been born on American soil were called native Americans. So, if you want to differentiate, you can use "American Indian" and the meaning will be clear.