Talk:Indigenous peoples of Mexico

message: For dedicated editors of this page: The "Related Groups" info was removed from all  infoboxes. Comments may be left on the Ethnic groups talk page. Ling.Nut 16:50, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "related groups" info removed from infobox 

message: I haven't seen or heard any reference of this. Is there any source for this claim? Is not mentioned on his wikipedia Page. Hugo cantu (talk) 18:34, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've removed him. There is no reason to believe he claims indigenous status. It appears that someone writing on mexican atheletes has misunderstood the meaning of indigenous and put all atheletes born in Mexico in the "indigenous Mexican" category. I have rectified this now. ·Maunus· ·ƛ· 07:24, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Francisco Palencia as indigenous people

message: In the first paragraph it says that indigenous Mexicans constitute between 11 and 13% of the population, but in the second paragraph it says that 15% speak an indigenous language, which it says is fewer than the number of total indigenous Mexicans. Could someone more knowledgeable explain or correct this?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.105.35.199 (talk) 23:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for picking that up. The 15% value was incorrect, it was one of a number of unjustified adhoc changes to the stats that was carried out here a little while ago, by someone apparently wishing to inflate the figures for whatever reason. The actual value from INEGI out of the 2005 census is abt 6.7& of the total Mexican population over the age of 5 years, who speak an indigenous language. Figure is now corrected.--cjllw ʘ TALK 00:25, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

text: Hello! Thank you for your comment. To clarify, Indigenous is not about features/race, indigenous is about political status (in Mexico defined by the government as "awareness that one is indigenous") and is defined by Indigenous communities generally through kinship/community ties and cultural knowledge/connection. Basing Indigenous identity on race takes away the sovereignty/right to self determination of indigenous communities and replaces it with foreign, pseudoscience concepts like race science. Amerindian/Indian is the racial label ascribed to Indigenous Peoples of Mexico (and the greater Americas) by Europeans, but it is a colonially-imposed racial label (concept of race itself is imposed) and is not synonymous with Indigenous. While different organisations/institutions and governments may have different definitions, the cultural/political/community-based definition is more aligned with Indigenous perspectives. Perhaps a page should be made about Amerindian/Indian race/racialization. Nativebun (talk) 19:30, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Number of indigenous people in Mexico

message: The most reliable source of information on the indigenous peoples of Mexico comes from Mexico's own National Commission for the Development of the Indigenous Peoples (Mexican acronym: CDI) and Mexican National Institute of Statistics and Geography (Mexican acronym: INEGI), as well as publications made by universities or peer reviewed articles or journals and encyclopedias (that aren't wikipedia). 
*Website for the CDI: 
*The following CDI links have more specific demographics and also defines the criteria for people to be counted as indigenous:  This other link will take you to where you can look at more articles which are similar to the previous one: 
*An academic publication by the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México which reveals racial demographics of various countries, Mexico included: 
*INEGI Publication:   Ocelotl10293 (talk) 02:15, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that most of these are reliable. The exception is the paper by Lizcano which completely confuses the terms race and ethnicity - describing "negro" and "indigena" as an "etnia" (ethnic group) which they are of course not. I would advocate the use of all of the mentioned sources except that one for use in the article. And I would strongly reccomend against relying solely on these official mexican sources - but instead supply with well chosen English language scholarly articles from respected journals. ·Maunus·ƛ· 11:03, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh and I would add INALI to the list of reliable sources - in my opinion they are more so than the CDI.·Maunus·ƛ· 11:05, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The main problem we are having here as well as in all the Mexico-related articles when it comes to race or ethnicity is that there is a lack of reliable sources. This is why I added this section so people can bring here whatever they can find and then analyze it to see if we can use the information. That is why I mention that, in Mexico at least, the term Indígena is a political term rather than a racial one. Mexicans that are racially indigenous but who do not fit the criteria for being Indígenas by not speaking an indigenous language or belonging to an established indigenous community are not counted as indigenous thus reporting a much lower number of racially indigenous Mexicans than there actually are. I also have to warn that the genetic studies are only abstract and only apply to the specific regions where they were conducted. For example: a 20% African admixture taken from a sample in small town of Veracruz does not infer that the overall genetic composition of the entire nation is 20% African admixture; I mention this because I have seen people misuse the data to either boost or reduce demographical numbers. The first thing we must sort out here is this Rave vs. Ethnicity issue. Ocelotl10293 (talk) 16:45, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

text: The concept of indigeneity itself—anywhere, not just in Mexico or Latin America—is inseparable from the socio-cultural-political contexts that the definitions are primarily founded in. The political dimension is apparent not only in the historical development of the term indigenous peoples, but also in its practical, cultural and legal appearances and uses. It is not a bad thing that this is so, nor does it render the definitions and uses somehow less valid. It's just how it is.It's neither necessarily nor sufficiently based in genetics (there is of course no 'indigenous' gene), genealogy, or even primacy in settlement of some given region. It has a basis in collective rights not individual rights, and so it's quite possible that given two individuals with "the same" admixture of 'native' heritage, one might be considered a member of an indigenous people/group and the other, not so considered (self-identified by themselves, and/or recognised by others).Thus the notion of 'racially indigenous' people/s is a bit of a furphy, one needs to be careful not to engage in WP:OR by claiming there are many more "really" indigenous people out there, based solely on genetics or bloodlines. All we can do is report on how and what qualified reliable sources identify as indigenous peoples in some particular regional context, and use those stats without coming up with our own versions. In the (probably universal) case where qualified sources arrive at different estimates, we'd just note the range and base any commentary within the article on their respective accuracies on any WP:RS 3rd-party sources that have examined the estimates, if there are any of these.--cjllw ʘ TALK 00:33, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Absolutely agree, glad someone said this a decade ago but unfortunately many people are still confused in 2023 about what it is to be socially/culturally/politically Indigenous versus racially Amerindian. Nativebun (talk) 19:53, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Reliable Sources of Information

message: I've reversed a series of recent edits that, while undoubtedly made in good faith, IMO introduced more problematic items than improvements. Some of the issues identified include:
*introducing a spuriously precise 'estimate' of ±22,466,593 that is not mentioned in any of the 3 sources given against it. Presumably this was arrived at by averaging some values incl. the aberrent 30% figure, that's not a statistically valid way of doing it. (nb this was since changed back by an anon to something more in-line with most of the published stats, but in doing so the previous cites to relevant sources were replaced).
*More emphasis / parity seems to be placed on sources such as CIA Factbook which as argued before is not a reliable or authorative source for this kind of info, and its ests regarded as exaggerated; see for eg Lizcano 2005: p.221, note j ["La importancia concedida a los indígenas por estas fuentes resulta exagerada"]
*inconsistency  with sources when mentioning %ages of overall population   
*Some invalid and non-RS sources were (re-)introduced, such as crystalinks.com (a non-copyright compliant mirror of wikipedia and other sources' texts, run by a self-proclaimed psychic that has no value as a source)
*Dividing the precolumbian history section into Mesoamerican chronological periods is not really applicable for the country as a whole; this periodisation doesn't make much sense if used for much of northern mexico, baja, etc. The history section does not need to be that detailed here in any case, just a brief overview required since the main focus shld be on the contemporary (when the term indigenous peoples is most usefully applied).
*The definitions/claims introduced re "racially indigenous Mexicans" seem problematic, as argued above in preceding section.
The original text was not perfect either, of course, and needs further work; but I think it stood closer to what the more reliable sources have to say, than the sum of those recent amendments. --cjllw ʘ TALK 03:34, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent reversions 

message: Why is Zapata put here on the pictures of the infobox? Zapata was a mestizo, sure he was pretty dark, but he still was a mestizo.
:Zapata was from Anenecuilco, Morelos. Around the turn of the century Anenecuilco was not a Mestizo town, it was an indigenous Nahua community (censuses from the time confirm this). Further more Zapata spoke Nahuatl which is documented by eyewitnesses. I know Womack says he wasn't indigenous but he is quite simply wrong on this point.·Maunus·ƛ· 06:42, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not sure what the answer to this is, I do not know if he was ethnically Indigenous or ethnically Mestizo. However, Zapatas article says "The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán and were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage" which indicates whoever wrote it views heritage or biological mixing as a process of dilution of Indigeneity, which is simply untrue. Zapata being mixed-race does not make him a cultural mestizo, it does not make him less Indigenous. If such a thing were true then there would be zero indigenous people in USA and Canada because they're even more biologically mixed than Indigenous people in mexico and even more mixed than ethnic mestizos. Indigenous is not a race. Amerindian is a race. There seems to be confusion between ethnic mestizaje and racial mestizaje. Ethnic mestizaje can include anyone of any race (white, black, asian, amerindian, mixed) who is culturally part of the colonial ideology/mational identity of mestizaje, which is very much not Indigenous. Then there is racial mestizaje, which means someone is mixed race/ancestry but does not determine someones cultural/political/.ethnic belonging as either ethnically mestizo or ethnically Indigenous (they could be either or neither). Indigenous is about political/cultural/community belonging, Amerindian race is about European-imposed race science. If someone speaks an Indigenous language and comes from an Indigenous community and generally opposes European worldviews, they are generally considered culturally/politically Indigenous and therefore NOT mestizo in mexico, regardless of their race. Zapata was racially Amerindian, but his ethnicity and political status and community belonging points towards him being an Indigenous person, not a Mestizo. The person who wrote his article seems to be conflating racial mestizaje with ethnic/political mestizaje, and also seems to not know that ethnic mestizaje is less about being "mixed heritage" and more about cultural assimilation to Latin European ideology & culture. "were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage" implies they think being racially mixed means that Zapata must be culturally/ideologically less indigenous/more mestizo. Nativebun (talk) 19:46, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: to reiterate, I don't know what the answer is. i don't know if he was ethnically/culturally/politically Indigenous or Mestizo. I am simply pointing out that the reasoning in the article about him is flawed and conflates two superficially similar but drastically politically different terms. Nativebun (talk) 19:50, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Emiliano Zapata 

message: The introduction to the article as it stands is very imprecise and indirect. It doesn't get to the point right away but instead deviates into Mexican politics which seems to overshadow the theme of the entire article. The information contained in the introduction is valuable and relevant nonetheless, but it should be placed latter in the article and the language should be clarified. Ocelotl10293 (talk) 05:42, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Article's introduction needs fixing 

message: I would need to see a source that Jose Carlos Ruiz claims indigenous status.  As far as I know, he is mestizo.69.235.151.118 (talk) 18:07, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jose Carlos Ruiz 

message: There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Plains Indians which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you.  —RM bot 07:30, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Would it be okay to move this article to Indigenous peoples of Mexico as opposed to "in" Mexico, since theoretically that could include indigenous peoples from Guatemala, Honduras, the United States, etc. who have immigrated to Mexico? -Uyvsdi (talk) 01:22, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: No response in a month, so I went ahead and moved the article. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:35, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Move discussion in progress

message: When giving a figure it is of course necessary to give the criteria by which the figure is derived. The CDI base their numbers INEGI who count only two things: speakers of indigenous languages and persons who live in households where the father, mother or one of the grandparents speak an indigenous language (and indigenous household). The figure of 10,1 million is arrived at by adding the 1,113,763  persons who live in Indigenous households and are younger than 5 years to the 5,856,975 persons who are older than 5 and speak an indigenous language and live in an indigenous household and the 2,719,520 who are older than 5 years and do not speak an indigenous language but do live in an indigenous household and finally add the 413,313 who speak an indigenous language but do not live in an indigenous household. This is on page 7 of this pdf. ·Maunus·ƛ· 15:32, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: According to upsidedownworld.org "Indigenous people in Mexico are variously estimated to make up between 12 and 30 percent of the country’s 112 million people (the smaller, official, estimate is based on the number of people who speak an indigenous language)." Should add this info on top of page.--76.213.228.244 (talk) 22:15, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: No, that is not a reliable source for statistics.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:28, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Statistics

message: In the last paragraph of Independence from Spain, it says Mexico made changes to their constitution to allow for the self determination of indigenous. I looked in Article 2 as the sentence states and it does not say anything about this. There is no source and I cannot find the truth in this statement.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.105.197.60 (talk) 12:52, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: It didn't make changes to the constitution, there was no previous constitution, but the constitution after independence didn't distinguish between citizens based on indigenous status as had been the practice under colonial rule. This is mentioned for example in Suárez 1983, and in most books that describe the post-colonial transition for indigenous peoples.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:42, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mexican constitution changes 

message: This section seems a bit too essay-like to me. I feel that it needs to be re-worded to make it more encyclopedic but not really sure how to go about it. Pro66 (talk) 21:12, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I've removed it. Too much editorializing and personal essay and too few sources. It does leave a gap in the article that we should adress by pulling together the best sources on indigeneity and identity in Mexico. That will be a bit of a job.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:43, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  The perception of indigenous identity in Mexico 

message: According to the 2010 United States Census there are 175 thousand "Mexican American Indians" in the United States. There doesn't appear to be a lot written about this diaspora as a distinct group within the greater Mexican American population. I was wondering if anyone would know where to find better references regarding this population to help improve that Native Americans in the United States article.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 04:26, 10 September 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: This book to which I have access looks like a good place to start:.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:47, 10 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  In the United States 

message: During the the Mexican era of the presant day west of the United states the Native Americans at the time would of been Mexican Indians but after America won the war with the expansion to nearly half of Mexico's boundries to eleven terrotories, did the Mexican Indians in the conqured provences become American Indians? --120.151.240.14 (talk) 08:28, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, they did.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:01, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mexican American War 

message: Hello,
	I am editing this article for a university class. My main focus will be on the rights of indigenous peoples of Mexico. I plan to start a new section on rights and improve the article. I plan to improve the history section of the article because understanding the history is important to understand why topics relating to rights happened. In the History section of the article I plan to add a section on 19th Century, 20th Century, and 21st Century history. However, my first priority will be to make the section on rights of indigenous people robust. The section on the rights of indigenous people would include: land rights, linguistic rights, right to representation, and reproductive rights. I also see there was talk about the perception of indigenous identity in Mexico which would also be interesting to include works by Diego Rivera.
Any input would be appreciated!
Thanks!
Nnlpz (talk) 01:35, 3 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Indigenous Rights in Mexico 

message: I think you've made great contributions to the article. I would try to increase the variety of your sources to ensure you are not pulling information from a limited number of perspectives. I think the "Land rights" section (note the the "r" should not be capitalized) would benefit from further explanations and specific details of information like you added to the "Linguistic rights" section. You do a great job of having a neutral point of view and providing readers a comprehensive overview of these topics. I think a great addition to this portion of the article would be to add more information on history's impact on these rights in present day as well as providing more information on how these rights look to modern day indigenous people.
MBouchein (talk) 05:49, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Advice for Nnlpz

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message: In 5.6, Populations of less than 20,000, The bottom of the table highlights the name Soltec and links to he Honda Motor Company page for some reason. Could somebody with an account fix that?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.153.207.29 (talk) 22:18, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Small Wiki Link Error 

message: Didn't Mexico or just the indigenous peoples have their own, original language before the people from Spain travelled over there and make their own new version of the Spanish language?
:72.68.2.236 (talk) 21:51, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  I Know It Sounds Stupid, But…