Turk: Generally, an inhabitant of Turkey. However, members of minority groups within Turkey, such as the Kurds, do not consider themselves Turks.
The term is also used sometimes to refer more broadly to a member of any of the Turkic ethnic groups, such as Turkmen, Uzbeks, Kazakhs, Uighurs, or Azerbaijanis (Azeris).
Different Turkic peoples migrated over the centuries from their homeland, centered in modern-day Mongolia, and spread west as far as what is now Turkey and Azerbaijan.
The origins of the word "Turk" are not clear, but it may come from the Chinese tu-kin, which was the name associated with a Turkic people from the western borderlands of China circa 200 B.C.
Mustafa Kemal, the founder of modern Turkey, took the name "Ataturk," which means "Father of the Turks."
