No universal, standard definition. Usually considered to include cultural groups and their descendants who have a historical continuity or association with a given region, or parts of a region, and who currently inhabit or have formerly inhabited the region either before its subsequent colonization or annexation, or alongside other cultural groups during the formation of a nation-state, or independently or largely isolated from the influence of the claimed governance by a nation-state, and who furthermore have maintained, at least in part, their distinct linguistic, cultural and social / organizational characteristics, and in doing so remain differentiated in some degree from the surrounding populations and dominant culture of the nation-state. Also includes people who are self-identified as indigenous, and those recognized as such by other groups.