I have a real distaste for ‘expats’. Don’t get me wrong, some of my best friends are Brits living abroad; however, I refuse to call them expats. It’s the word I have an aversion to, not the people.
To put my dislike in context: I have lived in Spain for about 50 years and have friends here from all parts of the world. My life here brings me into contact with members of a huge international community. The only group of people I have an issue with are the self-declared ‘expats’ who either voted for Brexit and now complain vociferously about its effects on them, or who left their native countries because of the number of foreigners living there – or both.
Expat or migrant: the importance of connotation
Words are important, clearly. They hold cultural associations, imply certain values, and have connotations in the way they are used. This is particularly true of the words ‘migrant’ and ‘expat’. The European Commission says that, in a global context, a migrant is “a person who is outside the territory of the State of which they are nationals or citizens and who has resided in a foreign country for more than one year,” while the Cambridge English Dictionary defines a migrant as “a person that travels to a different country or place, often in order to find work”.
Either of these definitions could be applied to British pensioners living in Spain, Swedish academics teaching in Paris, or American graduates spending a few years working for the World Health Organization in Delhi, but such migrants are usually referred to as expats. In common usage, a migrant, depending on the stance of the speaker, is either associated with illegality, benefit scrounging, or job stealing, or is a vulnerable victim of circumstance in need of aid. Either way, a migrant is imagined as being from developing countries and non-white.
The media reinforce stereotypes
The media can be partly held to blame for the ubiquitous use of the word ‘expats’ to refer to Brits who have upped sticks and gone to live abroad, and also for perpetuating its connotations. Present company excepted (Bylines guidelines advise avoiding its use), the media tend to use it to refer to all Brits living abroad, but most manage to imply, at the same time, a certain stereotype. Present-day manifestations of expats have inherited some of the aura of the straw-hatted colonial rulers who had a much higher standard of living than the local people they ruled over.
Expats in the tabloid press and social media also become furious at post-Brexit regulations which affect them, and outraged by bans on dogs on beaches, perpetuating the myth that the pet lovers in town are all non-Spanish and that local authorities have scant regard for their interests or those of their ‘furry best friends’. The overall impression is that they live in ghettos of similar-minded people, have higher incomes than the local people and are generally entitled. They are also, almost without exception, white.
An appeal for ditching ‘expats’
As a former newspaper editor, I know – none better – that a five-letter word fits much better into a limited space than any of the alternatives. At the time of the Brexit referendum, I wrote jokingly about the impossibility of fitting the expression “British people living in the EU free movement and residence area” into a headline, and wondered about the word ‘alien’, as used on documentation for non-Americans. (‘Down with ‘Expats’ SUR in English, 24 June 2016).
During the recent general elections in the UK it was good to see the Electoral Commission, at least, refer to “overseas voters,” and the BBC and the Guardian avoided the E word. Many though, including The Times and the Evening Standard, still used it.
If the media could just be persuaded to use two more letters in their headlines and write about migrants rather than expats stuck in post-Brexit passport control queues, or migrants protesting about banking regulations in Cyprus, prejudices would be questioned and a whole mindset could be changed. Failing that – and given more space for the headline – ‘overseas residents’ in the UK media, and ’foreign residents’ in their local media, would be so much more neutral and balanced.
As for some of my best friends, I suppose I could refer to them as fellow foreign residents in Spain, or migrants, or even aliens, but I abhor all the stereotyping of ‘expats’. I am holding out against the word for as long as it takes.
