“Would not ALL of them be called Native Americans whether they came across the land bridge, down the coast by boat or of Polynesian descent across and up from South America.”
Or, if standard theories persist, someone might say no, those we call “Native Americans”, from any source, were really “Asians” in “origin” and they, not even “Native Asians” as, in the entire human race there are only “Native Africans”, the ancestors of us all - if standard archaeological theories were to persist. O.K. don’t shoot the messenger!!!
If standard evolution and archaeological theories were to persist, then in the human race there can only be “Native Africans”, as every other group of humans, anywhere else, were immigrants (not ‘native’) to other lands, from Africa, or immigrants - to additional lands - of those first immigrants; leaving only Africa as a source to be called “first humans here”. O.K. again; don’t kill the messenger!!!
I am, tongue and cheek, trying to hit on any idea of “first” peoples; as the story of humanity IS a story of migration, settlement, death, starvation & extinction, migration, settlement, conquest and merging cultures, migration, settlement, migration settlement - over and over. The ancestors of everyone’s ancestors came from somewhere else, if we go back far enough.
LOL, no argument from me on that. I seldom use the term “native American” as you and million of others born here fit that term. I call myself American Indian and even that is because a misguided explorer thought he was somewhere else in the world. I’m even wondering if “Aboriginal American” is correct.