Genocide denial in the context of Rwandan genocide denial

Ethnocide is the extermination or destruction of ethnic identities. Bartolomé Clavero differentiates ethnocide from genocide by stating that "Genocide kills people while ethnocide kills social cultures through the killing of individual souls". According to Martin Shaw, ethnocide is a core part of physically violent genocide. Some substitute cultural genocide for ethnocide, and other argue the distinction between ethnicity and culture. Cultural genocide and ethnocide have been used in different contexts.While the terms "ethnocide" and "ethnic cleansing" are similar, the intentions of their use vary. The term "ethnic cleansing" has been criticized as a euphemism used for genocide denial, while "ethnocide" tries to facilitate the opposite.

In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of a historical account. It involves challenging the orthodox (established, accepted or traditional) scholarly views or narratives regarding a historical event, timespan, or phenomenon by introducing contrary evidence or reinterpreting the motivations of the people involved. Revision of the historical record can reflect new discoveries of fact, evidence, and interpretation as they come to light. The process of historical revision is a common, necessary, and usually uncontroversial process which develops and refines the historical record to make it more complete and accurate.

One form of historical revisionism involves denying the moral significance or accuracy of the historical record. This type of historical revisionism is called historical negationism, and is contentious as it often includes denying the veracity of genuine documents, or deliberately manipulating statistical data to reach predetermined conclusions. The destruction or alteration of cultural heritage sites is also considered a form of illegitimate historical revisionism when it serves to deny the cultural or historical claims of ethnic groups. Negationists may use the term "revisionism" to portray their pseudoscholarship as legitimate, especially in the context of genocide denial.

Pseudohistory is a form of pseudoscholarship that attempts to distort or misrepresent the historical record, often by employing methods resembling those used in scholarly historical research. The related term cryptohistory is applied to pseudohistory derived from the superstitions intrinsic to occultism. Pseudohistory is related to pseudoscience and pseudoarchaeology, and usage of the terms may occasionally overlap.

Although pseudohistory comes in many forms, scholars have identified common features in pseudohistorical works. Pseudohistory is almost always motivated by a contemporary political, religious, or personal agenda. It frequently presents sensational claims or a big lie about historical facts which would require unwarranted revision of the historical record. Another hallmark is an underlying premise that powerful groups have a furtive agenda to suppress the promoter's thesis—a premise commonly corroborated by elaborate conspiracy theories. Works of pseudohistory often point exclusively to unreliable sources—including myths and legends, often treated as literal historical truth—to support the thesis being promoted while ignoring valid sources that contradict it. Some works adopt a position of historical relativism, insisting that there is no such thing as historical truth and that any hypothesis is equal to any other. Many works conflate mere possibility with actuality, assuming that if something could have happened, then it did.