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Tribe
Group
of people sharing customs, language, and territory,
such as the Apache people of
North America.
Anthropologists
stress the importance of kinship in tribes. Usually
a tribe has a leader, a religion teaching that all its
people are descended from a common ancestor, and a common
language and culture.
A
tribe is often small in size, is fairly limited in its
contacts with other societies, and is correspondingly
ethnocentric in its view of the world.
Experts
disagree about the relative importance of linguistic,
political, and geographical boundaries for defining
tribal groups. Whatever definition of tribe is chosen,
however, exceptions to it abound.
The
most important criteria for a tribe continue to be linguistic
and cultural resemblances.
The
word tribe has long been used by both anthropologists
and laypersons, but recently it has come under attack
as a derogatory term implying an inferior way of life.
Moreover, its use is inconsistent; it is not, for instance,
applied to modern European groups that meet the criteria
of the definition. The designations people or ethnic
group are generally preferred today.
"Tribe,"
Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2000 http://encarta.msn.com
© 1997-2000 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
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