'ethnocentric' originates from Greek, specifically the words 'ethnos' and 'kentron', where 'ethnos' meant 'people, nation' and 'kentron' meant 'center'.

'ethnocentric' developed from the noun 'ethnocentrism' (a term popularized in English by William Graham Sumner in 1906); the adjective was formed from that noun and the adverb 'ethnocentrically' by adding the adverbial ending.

Initially it referred to viewing the world with one's own group at the center ('regarding one's own people as the standard'); over time the core meaning has remained but has been used widely in anthropology and social criticism to describe bias toward one's own culture.