Here in Canada the People who lived here before the British and French arrived were once called Indians.. and more recently First Peoples, Indigenous, and Native American ....
There is much debate on whether or not they were the 1st people to live on this land. There is evidence that people once travelled to Canada thousands of years ago... maybe millions ? The DNA of most Native Americans are traced back to Asia, Siberia and other places. One group of Native Americans trace their DNA (Haplogroup X) back to Europe and the Near East.
At the moment all human DNA goes back to Africa. To say a people are First is difficult... maybe the only First People are Africans ? All humans originate in Africa. It is not easy to find “one” name for all these different people who lived in Canada thousands of years ago.
My maternal ancestors here in Canada are called Ojibwe, (Chippewa in the US) Since my Great Grandmother was a mix of French Canadian and Ojibwe we are called “Metis” ... mixed ancestry.
I know that many of the Ojibwe, Algonquin here in Ontario call themselves Anishinaabe...
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/anishinaabe
The origin of the name Ojibwe is unknown...
The meaning of the name Ojibwe is not known; the most common explanations for the name derivations are:
ojiibwabwe (/o/ + /jiibw/ + /abwe/), meaning "those who cook/roast until it puckers", referring to their fire-curing of moccasin seams to make them waterproof.
ozhibii'iwe (/o/ + /zhibii'/ + /iwe/), meaning "those who keep records [of a Vision]", referring to their form of pictorial writing, and pictographs used in Midewiwin sacred rites;
ojiibwe (/o/ + /jiib/ + /we/), meaning "those who speak stiffly" or "those who stammer", an exonym or name given to them by the Cree, who described the Ojibwe language for its differences from their own.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ojibwe
The Ojibwe are the Group of people with the Maternal DNA of Haplogroup “X”
The common occurrence of the mtDNA Haplogroups A, B, C, and D among eastern Asian and Amerindian populations has long been recognized, along with the presence of Haplogroup X.
As a whole, the greatest frequency of the four Amerindian associated haplogroups occurs in the Altai-Baikal region of southern Siberia. Some subclades of C and D closer to the Amerindian subclades occur among Mongolian, Amur, Japanese, Korean, and Ainu populations.
X is one of the five mtDNA haplogroups found in Indigenous Amerindian peoples. Unlike the four main American mtDNA haplogroups (A, B, C and D), X is not at all strongly associated with east Asia. Haplogroup X genetic sequences diverged about 20,000 to 30,000 years ago to give two sub-groups, X1 and X2. X2's subclade X2a occurs only at a frequency of about 3% for the total current indigenous population of the Americas. However, X2a is a major mtDNA subclade in North America; among the Algonquian peoples, it comprises up to 25% of mtDNA types. It is also present in lower percentages to the west and south of this area — among the Sioux (15%), the Nuu-chah-nulth (11%–13%), the Navajo (7%), and the Yakama (5%).[65] Haplogroup X is more strongly present in the Near East, the Caucasus, and Mediterranean Europe. The predominant theory for sub-haplogroup X2a's appearance in North America is migration along with A, B, C, and D mtDNA groups, from a source in the Altai Mountains of central Asia.
Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_history_of_indigenous_peoples_of_the_Americas
So, what do you call these people ? Probably “Indigenous” ... unless you know what tribe or Nation they belong to... Ojibwe, Cree, Algonquin, etc ....
This is an interesting article :
No perfect answer: Is it First Nations, Aboriginal or Indigenous? Indigenous Affairs - March 06, 2019
