tribe
tribe Lexical Profile
tribe Game Scores & Validity
• noun
A social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader.
"The anthropologist spent several years living with a nomadic tribe in the desert."
A group or class of people who share the same profession, interests, habits, or strong sense of community.
"When she joined the local running club, she finally felt like she had found her tribe."
In biology, a taxonomic category that ranks above genus and below family or subfamily.
"In botanical classification, grasses are divided into several distinct subfamilies and tribes."
Word Nuance & Usage
While legally and culturally embraced by many Indigenous peoples in North America, the term can carry colonialist or pejorative connotations when applied to African ethnic groups, where 'people' or 'ethnic group' is generally preferred.
• Rhymes for tribe
Word Origin & Etymology
Borrowed from Old French 'tribu', from Latin 'tribus', which originally denoted one of the three political and ethnic divisions of the early Roman state (likely related to 'tri-', meaning 'three').