“First Nation” is also the Canadian legal term for Native Americans/American Indians or aborigines as they are some times referred to. Wisconsin being on the northern border with Canada, its use may just be a little appropriation by a liberal student journalist.
Re: “First Nation” is also the Canadian legal term for Native Americans/American Indians or aborigines as they are some times referred to.”
I think you may be correct. I just visited my daughter a few weeks ago, who happens to live in Calgary.
We went on a trip to Jaspar in Alberta. Beautiful country. Anyway we stopped at a visitors center along the way and I was talking with a Canadian forest service guy, and I happened to mention “Native Americans” - I could tell he was uncomfortable with what I had said.
He was nice about it, but told me the accepted term by Canadian Indians is “First Nations.” I had not heard that term before. It is tough to keep up with the constantly changing PCism.