tribe

Plural: tribes

Noun

• A group of people sharing common ancestry, language, or culture.
• a social division of (usually preliterate) people
• a federation (as of American Indians)
• (biology) a taxonomic category between a genus and a subfamily
• group of people related by blood or marriage
• An ethnic group larger than a band or clan (and which may contain clans) but smaller than a nation (and which in turn may constitute a nation with other tribes). The tribe is often the basis of ethnic identity.
• A tribal nation or people.
• A nation or people considered culturally primitive, as may be the case in Africa, Australia or Native America.
• A socially cohesive group of people within a society.
• A class or group of things.
• A group of apes who live and work together.
• A hierarchical rank between family and genus.
• A group of affiliated Mardi Gras Indians.
• The collective noun for various animals.
• A family of animals descended from some particular female progenitor, through the female line.

Verb

• To distribute into tribes or classes; to categorize.

Examples

• the Duchess tribe of shorthorns
• The Formation of Kazakh Identity: From Tribe to Nation-state
• the Twelve Tribes of Israel; Germanic tribes; Celtic tribes
• We formed a small tribe of expert players, always discussing our Scrabble strategies.

Synonyms

clan, federation of tribes, folk, kin, kin group, kindred, kinship group, tribus

Related Words

ethnic