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this post was submitted on 22 Jan 2024
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askchapo
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Expatriate/expat
Maybe it is not a popular opinion. And perhaps calling it "bigotry" is too far. But I work in a different country from where I was born, and I consider myself an immigrant. I have however seen this trend of referring to educated professionals as "expats" to distinguish us from people who immigrate to escape conflicts and/or poverty. I don't agree that this distinction is necessary or valuable, and I feel uncomfortable when I am described with that term. If I am called that, I usually chuckle and let people know that I'm an immigrant!!
yeah I feel like the use of expat borders on
Expat emphasises where they came from (wealthy, 'first world') rather than where they've moved to. It's a way of keeping themselves seperate and unsullied with oblique reference to where they previously lived.
To me am "expat" is a person who's dispatched by their company or organization to work overseas and often has all their housing and expenses paid for. Almost always they'll be PMCs or PMC adjacent. The term used to imply a certain degree of prestige and wealth (imagine a PMC salary but you didn't have to pay for housing or transportation) so other people also latched onto it.
In Asia, where I'm from and live, it's mostly white western English "teacher" types who insist on being called Expats. For that reason, I make it a point to call them "migrant workers". Though if anything that's an insult to migrant workers since they work hard and perform socially valuable tasks, unlike most English "teachers" I know.
this for sure! this kind of bigotry doesn't apply to me as a
but this does always bother me
I always just thought that "expat" meant a person dispatched by a company or organization to do work in another country and with an expectation that the worker in question moves back to their country of origin when their contract is over. Whereas an immigrant tends to be a person who moves permanently / with an idea to settle in another country. Though i will agree with the other commenters here that my definition of "expat" is essentially a whites-only word for "migrant worker".