Derived from the Greek ‘ethnos’, which is usually rendered as ‘nation’, it designates shared beliefs, values, experiences, loyalties and a subjective sense of common origin among self-defined groups of people. The term is close in meaning to race, but is often used in preference because it lacks the latter’s problematic biological dimension. In contrast to race, which tends to be used to express hierarchical discrepancies in power, ethnicity is a matter of self-perception and is generally of an affirmative order. It primarily refers to cultural distinctiveness. However, in its first usage it was used to designate heathen ‘others’, and a trace of this pejorative origin lingers inasmuch as ethnicity is usually only used in relation to minority, or other non-hegemony groups. See also Creoleness; diaspora; hybridity; négritude. Further Reading: W. Sollors (ed.) Theories of Ethnicity: A Classical Reader (1996).