Definition of: ethnic

(eth′nik) adjective
1. Of or pertaining to race, races, or peoples.
2. Pertaining to groups or stocks of mankind as having certain physical, mental, or cultural characteristics in common, and usually but not necessarily living within a given geographic area; ethnological.
3. Belonging distinctively to a race.
4. Pertaining to peoples neither Jewish nor Christian; gentile; heathen; pagan. Also eth′ni·cal.
—noun Colloq. A member of a minority ethnic group, esp., in the U.S., a non-black minority. [<Gk. ethnikos <ethnos nation]
—eth′ni·cal·ly adverb