Ethnogenesis

Ethnogenesis (from the Greek ethnos ἔθνος, "group of people" or "nation", and genesis γέννησις, "origin, birth", pl. ethnogeneses) is the process by which a group of human beings comes to be understood or to understand themselves as ethnically distinct from the wider social landscape from which their grouping emerges. This recognition of culture creation has caused some historians to place traditional teleological nation-building narratives into the framework of legend, when they were once uncritically accepted as historical facts.