I am not an expat - or am I?
(Image adapted from original by Vince Algoni, Creative Commons license)
Just the other day I heartily agreed with a friend of mine that the term ‘expat‘ isn’t a good description for people who choose to make their home in a foreign country. For him the term is most closely associated with corporate employees who spend a year or two recreating their own country within the borders of another while waiting for their tour of duty to end; never learning more than a few words of their host culture’s language and little else about their surroundings.
And then I happened to notice that I use the very same term on this blog site, which I describe as ‘An Expat’s Exploration’. Hmm. Am I such a hypocrite?
I had completely forgotten my use of the word here during that discussion. Of course I don’t liken myself to those who fit the above profile; of course the point of leaving a place is not to return to it as quickly as possible without absorbing anything from your surroundings, etc. And that’s true. But does the term describe only them? Or do my friend and I fit into the expat category too?
Is expat a bad word?
Yes. Only because it’s a really unnecessary truncation of the word ‘expatriate’, which has a more pleasing cadence and a solid etymological foundation. But then, despite my tendencies towards selective linguistic despotism, I’m no bulwark of grammatical purity; I say ‘gunna’ and ’shoulda’ and other things worse than ‘expat’.
Expatriate then: is it a bad word? I tend to say no, if only because I think the full word has escaped that close association with the disinterested corporate nomads of today’s global landscape. For me, the term invariably reminds me of two books that I read for the first time at the age of 13: The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises. There was a real allure to the romantic vision of expatriate life that the personas of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemmingway and the rest of the Lost Generation represented.
In fact, now that I think about it, it must be at least partly due to an overly romanticized notion of their expatriate existence that I set out for Europe in the first place. (Thanks boys!)
But my life - thankfully - bears little resemblance to the portrait that Hemmingway painted of Fitzgerald in A Moveable Feast, nor to that he painted of himself in… well, just about everything he ever wrote. And really, as an adult, there is no point trying to live a life that appealed to the uninformed, fanciful imaginings of your thirteen-year-old self. And yet, should I refrain from using a term, or its common abbreviation, simply because it was once imbued with impractical adolescent ideals? If that were the case, I’d have to drop a lot of useful words from my vocabulary. (I was a raging romantic in my time.)
Coming to terms with the term
As with most research that I do, I was happy to stop when I found that answer that I was looking for. In this case, a definition of the term expat/expatriate that I was comfortable with. This one comes from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary:
Main Entry: ex·pa·tri·ate
Function: verb
2: to withdraw (oneself) from residence in or allegiance to one’s native country; intransitive verb: to leave one’s native country to live elsewhere ; also : to renounce allegiance to one’s native country
I’ll derive my meaning for the noun form from this definition, which I find quite suits me and the other ‘expats’ that I’ve met along the way. We have all voluntarily left those ‘native’ places, we are living elsewhere - not just passing through - and we may or may not have renounced allegiance to our various homelands. If the glove fits…
The renunciation bit is often the most difficult to ascertain and it has often been the sticking point in defining and using the term ‘expat’ for me. For many, it seems that the homeland - whichever it is - is a vital part of their identity; one that helps define who they are. These expats, whatever their motives for leaving, take away a culturally based sense of self that binds them to their place of origin on both a conscious and unconscious level. Even in the extreme of a complete rejection of that home country, the definition persists but in an inverted state; they remain defined by how they are not like other Germans, Americans etc. (Random examples, by the way.)
At the risk of offending any and all Canadians reading this, I have to say that I haven’t felt the need to renounce allegiance to Canada because I’ve never really felt any in the first place. You might attribute this to the fact that I was born in England, but then Katie (born and raised in Canada) feels much the same.
I know some Canadians who have patriotic tendencies, but in many ways Canada’s identity is best described in references to others’. Our spelling is a mix of British and American standards as are most of our cultural norms. It’s often a desire to not be American that causes Canadians to focus on the minor points that differentiate ‘us’ from ‘them’.
But my views on Canada’s cultural identity can wait. For now, I’ve come to terms with the term ‘expat’ as one that’s fairly open to interpretation.
The closest thing to patriotism that I have ever felt has been directed towards Spain, but I’m no patriot. Today, Valencia is our home and I am enchanted by it and the country of which it forms such a vital part. One day we may move on, who knows? I haven’t sworn undying allegiance to Spain any more than I ever did to Canada. I suppose the best term for me would be something like ‘no-pat’. But I’m just not prepared to start describing myself with such a silly made-up term. I’m happy to use the more accepted, if not less silly and invented, term.
I guess I am an expat after all.
Canadian identity is hard to define, but only if you’re talking about English Canada. Go to Quebec and you will find Canadians who have absolutely no trouble defining exactly who they are without needing to add “…and besides, we’re not Americans” into the mix. Then again, Quebec is indeed a separate country in many ways.
Thanks for your comment Ian. You’re absolutely right that Quebec has a very distinct and seperate cultural identity. I was approaching the concept of Canadian identity as it relates to me and my anglo experience. In many ways the eastern provinces of Canada are also free from the scenario that I describe, though I think that there are other factors at play too. I can only speak to what I know first-hand from my time in Ontario and BC, and also the cultural persona that is presented in popular (again anglo) culture.
Great comment - thanks again!
having lived in canada as a spaniard for most of my life i find that Canada is nearly a subculture of Britishness.
A weird one though. Arrogant yet appologetic. Ignorant yet accepting of culture. And ultimately self loathing.
It is hard to pinpoint and that is what basically defins canadian culture.. its like an anticulture
Javier, thanks for the comment. I’d love to hear your corresponding thoughts on Spanish culture as well.
Another explanation of expat by David Wolf of Silicon Hutong as part of an interview conducted by Lost Laowai China Blog:
Someone very wise once said to me that there are two kinds of expats in China: the ones who are here for a good time, and the ones who are here for a long time. I have heard other, less kind voices say that the definition of an expat is someone who has failed at home so goes abroad to redeem himself, the “loser back home” stereotype.
I like these quotes because they hint at a greater truth - expats as a crowd are a boulliabase - varied, interesting, and impossible to characterize in any simple way. Expats in China - expats anyplace - are pioneers, people who for varied motives have left their homes in the hopes of making a better life someplace else regardless of the challenges that effort implies.
In any country, though, a core community develops of people who are here because our skills, our attitudes, and our values fit into our host country in a way that is natural, almost effortless. And it’s like a silent club - we know each other when we see each other, and over time we identify someone who falls into that core community with three simple words that are the ultimate praise - “he gets it” or “she gets it.”
Each individual in that community is a bit weird. For me the beauty of this core of expats is their difference, their variety of viewpoints, and their weirdness. And those people succeed here and in other places where change and disruption are the only constants, and where people accustomed to more genteel conditions wind up as road-kill. They are living proof of Hunter S. Thompson’s classic axiom “when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.”
Could the going be any weirder than it is here?
I have a hard time with “Canadian identity is hard to define”. I am a Canadian who currently lives in the greater Los Angeles area. I grew up in Canada for nearly 25 years. I know Canada is often the “red-headed step child of America/Britishness” but I think differently. It’s individual pride that lends to this thought. If BC/Canada is all you know, as it is for me (and my opinion is only that, my opinion) it’s a real place. I don’t need to sport a “maple leaf” tattoo on my chest to observe my patriotism. But it’s there. My identity is simply what I identify with.
Def: ‘the condition of being oneself or itself, and not another’
I love the fact that Canada as a country has the ability to boast about it’s cultural diversity. I appreciate the opportunity.
Canada to me is a place that will always accept me. For that, I know I will always have a home.
I also love the fact that it allows me to engage in any kind of debate, it allows me to learn.
Learnin’ is good.
Interesting article Ivan. One that left me very glad and a wee bit sad. Very glad that I can proudly say I am Canadian. I find it’s something I don’t analyze nor oddly even question (as questioning is what I do best!). I just feel it - deep inside. Home. A warm comfortable place to be, to have, to know. And I feel just a wee bit sad that you don’t have that also. But you will. I hope.
Susan,
Thanks for reading and for taking the time to comment - I appreciate it.
When it comes to patriotism and national identity, I think that we have fundamentally different views. There is nothing remotely sad about my situation. Did you know that the BC border was decided upon in the Oregon Treaty of 1846? To me, that’s pretty arbitrary. What does it matter which side of that line you live on? I don’t want to define myself by a series of political events.
Okay, it’s not that simple. And yet it is. As I strive to learn more about this miraculous planet we live on and the amazing accomplishments of its human inhabitants, the limiting, arbitrary definitions that apply to nations have less and less meaning. The kind of home that you describe sounds a bit like a hibernating bear’s den: a place to curl up and be safe; a place to hide away from the world. For me - quite happily - home is Katie and Oscar and a wonderfully light feeling that accompanies us on our journeys.
The idea that you feel even a twinge of sadness for me is ridiculous. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not questioning your intent. It’s just that there really is no need. Do I feel ‘at home’ in Canada? Yes. (Well, in some parts of it anyway.) Do I feel ‘at home’ in Valencia? Yes. And I can’t wait to find the many, many other places in the world that I’m sure will offer that feeling of slipping easily into place, of clicking with the local culture. In Canada, I didn’t really click, I was just there by default. I think maybe you do click in British Columbia - great! You have a home that makes sense for you. So do I. They are completely different and I’m sure that neither of us would trade for anything in the world.
I thought it was interesting, the picture you painted in your comment. A great discussion topic sometime.
Ivan, what made me a bit sad was the thought that you did not have a ‘feeling of home’. For me it is such a good feeling that in my heart I wish that feeling for you. For everyone actually. I can’t argue whether or not my feeling is ‘right’ but I could argue that I am entitled to it. So a wee bit sad I was, a wee bit sad I am. However ‘ridiculous’ that might seem.
“I always felt like a foreigner from the beginning of life so when I actually became one, I felt more at home.” - Tim Burton
I quite relate to that quote as I never really felt like I “belonged” in Canada, even though I was born there. Somehow I just didn’t fit in. But the first day I came to Spain (May 1992) I had an overwhelming sense of “coming home”, and that feeling has never left me.
I’ve never called myself an expat. I think it’s a rather ugly word, and I wouldn’t like to identify myself as an “ex” anything.
Love this blog, Ivan. I’d like to ask you for some wine advice some day if you wouldn’t mind.
I’ve been an expat all my life in many ways. I was born in Wales to an English father and Welsh mother, but her mother was English. At the age of a few months we left Wales to live in various places in England, as my father was in the navy and was posted to several different ports. By the age of 11, when he left the force and got a job in a bank in Liverpool, I’d lived in more than ten different houses, so I never really belonged to any one place, only to my immediate family, as it were.
Then my parents divorced and I moved back to my birthplace, Caernarfon in North Wales, with my mum and two sisters. Now in Wales about 20% of the population speak Welsh (a language for those who don’t know it as different to English as, say, Russian is to French), but in Caernarfon, which has been a hotbed of Welsh nationalism for many years, this figure is something like 90%. I don’t speak Welsh, so while I was living in my birthplace I was unable to understand a lot of the time what my classmates were talking about, or listen to conversations in the shops and when older in the pubs, etc. Everyone speaks English as well and most of my schooling was in that language, but I still felt like an outsider in my own land. Did this make me uneasy, depressed? Funnily enough, I don’t think so; it rather made me aware of the peculiar nature of patriotism and belonging to somewhere in general, and made me want to discover more of the world and not end up in a parochial side street as I thought (arrogantly, probably) as many of the “full-time” citizens of Caernarfon seemed to be.
Since that time I’ve lived in Sudan and Spain, in various places in each country, as well as in England and South Wales, and though there have been towns I’ve found less interesting and stimulating than others, on the whole I’ve treated these places as my home and not found the distance from my country any disadvantage at all. During this time my mum went to live in Israel for 4 years and then in France for 2 years…and my sisters spent varying amounts of time in Israel as well, so home was often simply where the rented flat was.
Now my sisters are both living in the east of England; I’ve been in Valencia for a number of years and share my life with a woman from Germany and our son who was born in Valencia. I hope that Daniel, our son, will grow up with a fondness for the city he was born in but realising at the same time that there are other places out there and that blind patriotism (I’m not accusing any of the other bloggers here of this, by the way!) is neither conducive to an open-minded outlook on life nor the only option open to people in general. And, all things considered, I quite like being a “man of the world”, however trite this may sound.
Okay, think I’ve taken up enough space now!
I love this last comment from Martin, not because his story mirrors my own experiences, but because it is so different. And yet: I agree completely with his take on nationalism and a sense of home that can be carried with you…
My parents moved to a small Canadian town in the interior of British Columbia when I was 9 months old. All three of my siblings were born there and my parents still live in the house they moved to when I was 5.
I had a very stable, priviledged (in many ways) and ‘Canadian’ upbringing - forays into the USA notwithstanding, I had very little experience with the rest of the world until I left at 18 to spend a year in Japan. A difficult trip, in many ways, but also eye-opening…
I have been in Spain for almost 9 months and, despite missing my extended family in North America, I feel more at home here than ever I did in Canada. In some ways I feel lucky to have been born in Canada - life there certainly afforded me experiences, freedoms and luxuries that much of the world isn’t privy to. On the other hand it’s since leaving the continent (for good?) that I’ve become very aware of how isolationist and ethnocentric (or ‘culturally-centric’ - to coin a phrase) North America tends to be.
I consider myself to be Canadian by an accident of birth and so don’t necessarily feel any particular sense of patriotism or connection to that country. Instead, my connection is to my family and it travels wherever they do.
Like Martin, I see myself as being a ‘citizen of the world’ and I think the greatest gift Ivan and I can give our son is the opportunity to be the same.
Hi,
I was very interested in this particular discussion on the use of the word “Expat”. Running a site aimed at English speaking families I often find myself struggling to define this group in a single word. Inevitably the Expat title comes to mind time and time again. I have intermittently used descriptions such as “International” (aiming to reflect the potential diversity in this particular group). “Residents from overseas” is another favourite. This does not mean I am any more comfortable with either of these than I am with the Expat tag.
My greatest struggle with defining ourselves as non-native residents is the distinction between the term “immigrant” and the term “expat”. I often see associations or written publications directed at Latin American groups for example in Barcelona in which they happily refer to themselves as immigrants. When it is “Monthly Welcome Cocktails” or a “Breakfast Talk on Relocation” organised by one of the European/American style International Societies, then Expat is automatically the favoured word.
I can only imagine that, in the English language at least, many find the word “immigrant” pejorative. Hear the difference between “We live in an area where there are lots of immigrants” vs. “There are lots of expats in my area”. It seems that in some communities at least, the world of F. Scott Fitzgerald lives on.
Great and thought provoking post Ivan. I’ve honestly never taken the time to consider if I am, or am not, an expat. Falling to ignorance, I have defined myself as an expat to describe my living outside of the USA, but not as renouncement of my country. However, when we left the USA, it was in large part related to Bush’s re-election; whereby proving that, yes, we are “expats”. But now that the current leadership has changed, are we still expats?
Additionally, I rather like Tim Burton’s quote, equally defining a state of being I have felt very akin to. I am a nomad, and have never felt tied to one culture or another, but rather humanity as a whole. So where does that place me?
Defining oneself, and one’s intentions, is not always as easy as I would like it to be, but posts like this give us pause to reconsider how we define ourselves. Thanks Ivan!
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