I used to think of an expat as this dirty blonde haired white guy with a killer tan who ran a business on the beach. I would think of Ernest Hemingway and Humphrey Bogart.
Here's looking at you, kid.
Now that is a romantic life!
I didn't picture 6 Indian guys living in a room sending every extra coin they can home to their extended family.
That is not a romantic life, and therefore certainly not an expatriate one.
It has certainly never occurred to me that the white guy running the business in the Caribbean, the old novelist sipping wine, the owner of Rick's Cafe in Casablanca and little 22 year old Sanjit from India hurriedly bagging my groceries at Lulu are essentially all the same.
There was a difference, right? Some are expats, and others are often called immigrants or migrant workers. But, terms like "migrant worker" or "immigrant" or any of the same just don't apply to Ernest Hemingway and Humphrey Bogart.
Think about it for a minute. If someone asked you to describe the difference between "expat", "migrant worker" and "immigrant", what would you say?
I will tell you my answers before I left and got out of the United States:
Expat - white collar job holders who left their country to work in another. These are professionals who have been selected by companies to work in another country, sought out and paid for their talents the home country can't provide.
Migrant Worker - Blue collar job holders who left their country to work in another. They can be legal or illegal - I have heard the term describe both. These are people who have sought out to leave their country to make more money somewhere else.
Immigrant - This one actually stumped me when I thought about my definition. I have worked in bars and kitchens for half of my life, and this word was thrown around to describe the guys in the back. When I thought how could I differentiate between this and migrant worker, I justified it to myself as "an immigrant doesn't have to work - like a mother who comes with her kid and husband, but stays home to raise the children" but an immigrant can be a migrant worker...but not the other way around. Easy, right?
I was serious to myself and realized something was very wrong here.
And I bet if you are serious with yourself you probably have some trouble defining each clearly and effectively different from the others even though you hear the terms all the time and know exactly what they mean when you hear them.
You hear them on the nightly news, in casual conversation around the water cooler, and online articles and stories. You know these words are different.
So what is the difference...really?
I will just give you the straight Dictionary Definitions:
So an Expatriate is someone who lives outside their country of birth.
Fair enough...
And an Immigrant is someone who lives in another country.
That makes sense...
And a Migrant (Worker) is someone who moves to another place in hopes of a better life.
I see now...
Well, they are a little different...
I mean, it isn't like expat is a synonym of migrant which is a synonym of immigrant...
I mean...
Um...
So I guess my point is the differences we think we know in these words comes from a cultural superiority maybe? Maybe, much like me, (even if I denied it to myself) my envisioning of an expat was a white guy - a professional. My envisioning of a migrant worker was a Mexican guy - someone who just came and took any old job they could. And my envisioning of an immigrant was confused, but I guess I settled on just about the same as a Migrant Worker, but also included people with no jobs.
I never would have called Julio, my friend from years back when I worked at a bar in my last home town, an expatriate. And sad thing is, he wouldn't have either.
Expats aren't white, though it seems the word has kind of come to mean that. When I even analyzed my own personal definitions of the words that is kind of where it was headed.
Why is it when an American leaves the US for a job they are an expat, and when a Nigerian moves to the US to be a nanny they are a migrant worker? It sure isn't the definitions.
Maybe it is because of the difference between an immigrant wanting to stay permanently and an expat being able to leave at any time? There are millions of white expats that have become permanent residents of other nations to retire...do they then get referred to as immigrants?
Nope. Still expats.
I don't have real plans to return to live in the US any time soon. In fact, I wouldn't mind settling in another country to live. At what point do I change from immigrant to expat - when I get citizenship?
At what point did Julio turn from expat into immigrant - after he got citizenship?
But that is different, right?
How did it come to be that an "immigrant" is something you don't want to be? Does the word have leftover connotations for Europeans? Is it an unwelcome bunch of people coming to your country? I know in the US that is how it is thrown around.
And yet it never occurred to me to refer to my hematologist, an Indian guy, as an expat either. And he was most welcome.
300 years ago Irish coming to the US for work and a better life were immigrants and generally not wanted.
Now Irish coming to the US for work and a better life are expatriates and are sought after.
I know I am rambling, but recently it has just been on my mind - the difference and how calling someone one or the other immediately denotes how you can treat them. In the UAE migrant workers can't strike or join unions...but expats can. Migrant workers are actually treated like slave labor by some employers - but they would never dream of taking the passport and holding it from an expat.
Why? What is the difference?
It seems like the reason the words mean different things is just so we get to think of, and even treat people differently.
So give it a try and see if you can find your own definitions instead of just using the ones people around you have been throwing around.
Maybe you disagree with me and you have legitimate differences between them. Hey, good for you. I am glad you took the time to think about it, and hopefully it was interesting to debate it with yourself or even a co-worker.
But at the end of the day, in the dictionary, an immigrant is someone who migrated for work and became an expatriate.
And of course, all of this is just my opinion. We are free to define things how we want, but it is a worthwhile and honest task to at least have a look at how we define them, and why.
And no - this will not turn into an philosophical debate blog. Last time I spent hours editing a monkey gland sauce movie that ended up being quite terrifying.
Gah.
Monkey Gland Sauce.
The funny stuff will return next time. I am off to India in a few days with a dozen teenagers so there will be plenty to talk about!
Here are a few links to some sources I referred to to help clarify my own definitions:
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