Words Mean Things: Katrina Survivors are NOT “Refugees”
Definitions of “refugee,” from Dictionary.com:
– One who flees in search of refuge, as in times of war, political oppression, or religious persecution.
– An individual seeking refuge or asylum; especially an individual who has left his or her native country and is unwilling or unable to return to it because of persecution or fear of persecution (as because of race, religion, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion).
– An exile who flees for safety.
So why are Katrina survivors labeled “refugees” in mainstream media reports? Just three of dozens of examples: here, here (7th para), and here (2nd para). I have also heard the word used (obviously in error) in numerous TV accounts.
And to what end? Are our reporters and editors merely vocabulary-challenged, or are they trying to make some kind of crude point?
_______________
UPDATE: A commenter thinks the third definition (”exile who flees for safety”) fits.
So let’s go the to non-Biblical noun definitions of exile:
(first set)
1a. Enforced removal from one’s native country.
1b. Self-imposed absence from one’s country.
2. The condition or a period of living away from one’s native country.
3. One who lives away from one’s native country, whether because of expulsion or voluntary absence.
The key word in all of these is country–not city, not state, not parish.
(second set)
1. voluntarily absent from home or country [syn: expatriate]
2. expelled from home or country by authority [syn: deportee]
3. the act of expelling a person from their native land; “men in exile dream of hope”; “his deportation to a penal colony”; “the expatriation of wealthy farmers”; “the sentence was one of transportation for life” [syn: deportation, expatriation, transportation] v : expel from a country; “The poet was exiled because he signed a letter protesting the government’s actions” [syn: expatriate, deport] [ant: repatriate]
The key word in Item 1 is “voluntarily”–not the case with the hurricane and the levee breaks. The key point in Items 2 and 3 are “by authority” and “the act”–It’s the hurricane and the levee breaks that did the expelling; the authorities simply used the logic of trying to keep everyone safe when they ordered an evacuation. That doesn’t change what the reason (not man-made) for the evacuation was. An added bonus in Items 2 and 3 is that a synonym for “exile” is “deportee,” which these victims are certainly not.
Finally, my MS Word Thesaurus tells me that the synonyms for “refugee” include person in exile; immigrant; migrant; and expatriate. No fits there, either.
So, in sum: Nice try, no sale–the use of the word “refugee” is incorrect, and would only be correct if we moved Katrina’s survivors to Mexico or Canada (out of the “country”). Only at that point would they become “exiles.”
So the big question remains: With all of the other correct words available (evacuees, survivors, those displaced, those made homeless by, etc., etc.) why pick a word that is plainly wrong?
UPDATE 2: Comment 3 goes to wiki and other sources to find that the least-used definition of refugee (the one containing the word “exile”) can then be taken to describe the Katrina survivors. As you will see from Comment 4, I think it’s a verrrrry long stretch, if it’s usable at all.
The ultimate point is that in 35 years of following news stories, I have NEVER seen victims of US natural disasters characterized as “refugees.” SO WHY NOW?
UPDATE 3: Conservative Culture agrees: “If you don’t think that this isn’t being framed as a political watershed moment, think again. Already the nation is using the term refuge(e). This word is being used intentionally and don’t dismiss what might be excused as a too casual use of the term….. We might dismiss it except for the political posturing and rheteroric already in full swing.”
UPDATE 4: Now THIS is really something. Michelle Malkin notes that African-American pot-stirrers (certainly not frequent BizzyBlog allies) are objecting to the use of the term “refugee” because it “calls up to mind people that come from different lands and have to be taken care of.” Well, yeah (although it could have been more eloquently expressed) that’s my point too.
I also e-mailed Michelle and, among other points, opined that her prior cites misused the word “refugee” even more obviously than I believe it is being misused with Katrina’s survivors, and that I question the frequency of the word’s prior use in prior natural disasters. Again, I have NEVER heard the term used until Katrina in any news accounts relating to US natural disasters.
So, in sum, I’m still holding out with my once-in-a-blue-moon agreers–the use of the word is at a minimum sloppy and inappropriate when so many other accurately descriptive terms are available, and at most, based on the preponderance of the evidence, just plain wrong.
UPDATE 5: Google News past-day searches as of 11:30 AM on September 7 (without quotes in search):
- hurricane refugees: 3,040
- hurricane evacuees: 5,500
- hurricane victims: 8,360
I didn’t include “hurricane survivors” because many of them are still in the affected areas and haven’t left. There’s some consolation that “refugee” is used less than 20% of the time, and there appears to be a bit more reluctance to use the term (based on random looks at TV reports). I still believe the term “refugee” is just plain wrong, and have seen nothing that would persuade me otherwise. It may well be that the dictionaries will get “updated” to reflect the misunderstood usage in the next few years; if so, language sloppiness will have won the day yet again.
UPDATE 6, Sept. 7, 8PM This AP piece focuses on the word’s use, and the President weighs in (bolds mine):
“The people we’re talking about are not refugees,” he said. “They are Americans and they need the help and love and compassion of our fellow citizens.”
The 1951 U.N. Refugee Convention describes a refugee as someone who has fled across an international border to escape violence or persecution. But the Webster’s New World Dictionary defines it more broadly as “a person who flees from home or country to seek refuge elsewhere, as in a time of war or of political or religious persecution.“
Hello? What in either definition fits the current circumstances. The second definition bold shows that the definition relates to man-made events.
What part of “exile who flees for safety” doesn’t fit?
Comment by Charlie (Colorado) — September 2, 2005 @ 1:18 pm
#1–See UPDATE. I researched “exile”–it doesn’t fit.
Comment by TBlumer — September 2, 2005 @ 1:55 pm
Actually it is a valid email address, you might want to check with your ISP. I’ve left a different one, however, on this post.
While the desire to do a pilpul or exegesis in order to preserve your honor is an understandable one, a little further examination yields:
Exile:
To be in exile is to be away from one’s home (i.e. city, state or country) while either being explicitly refused permission to return or being threatened by prison or death upon return.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exile
voluntarily absent from home or country
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
refugee:
an exile who flees for safety
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
one who flees in search of refuge, as in times of war, political oppression, environmental destruction, or religious persecution.
http://www.futureharvest.org/about/glossary.shtml
a person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or natural disaster.
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/refugee?view=uk
… and most simply:
one that flees;
I’m not sure why this little fidget seems so important to you, but it’s pretty clear that the people who use “refugee” in this context aren’t unjustified in ignoring you.
Comment by Charlie (Colorado) — September 2, 2005 @ 7:26 pm
I took out the ref to the bounceback e-mail. I deleted it from my inbox already, but as I recall the first three letters in the bounceback were “chr” (perhaps you skipped typing “a” as the third letter).
As to the definition, you ignored the next sentence in wiki: “It is common to distinguish between internal exile, i.e., forced resettlement within the country of residence, and external exile, deportation outside the country of residence.” It is fair to infer from wiki, though there is room for debate, that those in internal exile are NOT refugees.
The Princeton definition has been asked and answered, and is irrelevant. The Oxford definition contains “country,” and is also irrelevant. That leaves Future Harvest, which also refers ONLY to “country,” and gets thrown out.
You still haven’t made the sale. See Update 2 for why this is important.
Comment by TBlumer — September 2, 2005 @ 10:28 pm
[...] tentionally and don’t dismiss what might be excused as a too casual use of the term. Words do have meaning. Definitions of “refugee,†from Dictionary.com: – One who flees in search of refug [...]
Pingback by Conservative Culture » Blog Archive » Katrina’s Political Watershed — September 3, 2005 @ 10:26 am
I didn’t actually expect to sell you; I’m just pointing out that the way the word is being used is consistent with the definitions, so you might as well learn to cope.
As to why they’re being characterized as refugees, I’d be real interested what a Lexis/Nexis search would say on previous disasters — I’m pretty certain you’re mistaken, but I can’t easily check. But we’ve got people who look like refugees, act like refugees, and are fleeing their home in search of refuge.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, man.
Comment by Charlie (Colorado) — September 3, 2005 @ 10:38 am
#6, I would be doing exactly what you’re suggesting if I had better Net availability right now. It will have to wait until Tuesday.
I believe the burden of proof is on those who think the term “refugee” has been used in US disasters in the past. I don’t think so, and until I see otherwise, I won’t cope, I will strenuously object.
Comment by TBlumer — September 3, 2005 @ 6:03 pm
Well, conveniently enough:
“Hurricane refugees boosted Broward’s population 29 percent over the past decade to more than 1.6 million people. In sheer numbers, Broward grew more in the 1990s than any other Florida county.” “Hurricane Andrew left legacy of higher housing costs” (Sun-sentinel.com)
That’s one example; the word’s been used for Hurricanes Charley, Frances, and Ivan as well, as Michelle Malkin discovered.
In fact, Google produces about 247,000 uses of the phrase.
But what the hell, I don’t like it when someone uses “disrespect” as a transitive verb.
Comment by Charlie (Colorado) — September 5, 2005 @ 2:48 am
Well I must say that Michelle’s post turns the logic a bit. Righties don’t like refugee because Katrian’s evacuess aren’t crossing country borders, and now most lefty African-Americans are mad because it conjures images of…….”calls up to mind people that come from different lands and have to be taken care of.”
Well, Michelle and my good bud Colorado Charlie, that’s because that’s what the darn word’s primary meaning has been for all these years (despite the limited references to Andrew and Charley cited by Michelle, all of which I believe misuse the word more obviously than it is being misused with Katrina). Crossing country borders has always been integral to the common use of the word “refugees.”
The fact that you can get 300,000+ Googles (regular searches, I presume) doesn’t change that, because of this (also Google regular general searches):
- Hurricane refugee in the past year–299,000
- Hurricane refugee in the past six months–300,000
- Hurricane refugee in the past three months–300,000
- Hurricane refugee–298,000 “anytime”
That would indicate few if any previous uses (actually, negative, but that’s obviously absurd).
Now let’s go plural (all Google regular searches):
- Hurricane refugees–1,950,000 “anytime”
- Hurricane refugees–1,410,000 in past year
- Hurricane refugees–1,410,000 in past 6 months
- Hurricane refugees–1,410,000 in past 3 months
Still studying….. go to Comment 11 for more.
Comment by TBlumer — September 5, 2005 @ 3:27 am
Look you’re changing the terms of the question. I made the point that it’s very common, and consistent with the dictionary meaning. You said it wasn’t. I showed several dictionary descriptions with which it was consistent; you claimed it was new. I suggested that Lexis/Nexis would show differently and you agreed that would be interesting. now I don’t have a Lexis/Nexis account, but it happened that Michelle Malkin (who I’m not actually that happy with politically, just by the way) had made the same observation, and did searches I wasn’t able to do, and sure enough found that it had been common usage for at least four hurricanes — Katrina and three previous ones. You say it’s “limited”, I’ve got hundreds of thousands of uses. Oh, and your time distribution is flawed by sample error: there didn’t used to be an Internet. Since the total pages on the Internet are growing exponentially, the null hypothesis would be that the number of particular word references would also grow exponentially, and sure enough to an eyeball approximation that’s what they’re doing.
More to the point though, you’re asserting some Deep Reason — “trying to make some kind of crude point”. It’s pretty unlikely from what we’ve got here that the usage is all that new, and even if it were, then somehow it’s been spread out to hundreds of thousands of usages in just about a year (Ivan, Charley, and Frances all having been 2004 hurricanes.) It would take a pretty astounding secret cabal to spread this use of the word “refugee” against expected usage, into papers on three continents, in the span of about a year.
Look, I honestly sympathize: as I say, I hate the use of “disrespect” as a transitive verb. But seeing some conspiracy behind it just makes you look like a loon.
Thanks for fixing your comments format, though: it’s ever so much easier to read this way.
Comment by Charlie (Colorado) — September 5, 2005 @ 4:33 am
Darn, I knew you’d jump in before I got done.
The left-justify was done manually for this post only–I thought I’d fix the place up a bit in case Michelle Malkin comes by. :->
I don’t know whether you’ve read Update 4–I hope to hear from Michelle, as I wrote a detailed e-mail to her noting that objections to the word are not one-sided.
The fact is, you have to twist yourself like a pretzel to try make the word “refugee” fit; it still doesn’t work, and it is NOT consistent with dictionary meaning. You have to go to the third (i.e., least important) meaning of the word, and then limit the word “exile” to INTERNAL exile, when “exile” without the adjective “internal” before it is commonly understood to be external. That just won’t fly.
It appears that all of your hundreds of thousands of uses with “refugee” in singular are in the past year, implying it was seldom used previously. There is the plural “refugess” usage gap in Google, which requires a look-see, but I don’t know how to do it yet, and I’m not going to lose sleep over it, because of the next two paras that follow.
All 3 of Michelle’s previous cites obviously misuse the word to describe people who either were evacuated for a few days and returned (NO WAY someone who is gone only for a few days can be called a refugee), or evacuated and voluntarily decided to not go back to where the hurricane hit, even though there was nothing stopping them from going back. I think you would agree that those uses are improper. If not, if you think that I can evacuate for three days and be a refugee, or I can decide not to go back when I could and still be a refugee, we’ve descended into absurdity, and we might as well throw away the dictionary.
In sum, I have yet to see a pre-Katrina article that “properly” uses the word as you would believe it is “properly” used.
As to the conspiracy-loon reference, I don’t why there’s a group botch going on, but in my opinion, there clearly is, and making an observation that there is a group botch going on does not imply a conspiracy. Perhaps a meme that developed and then got repeated ad nauseam, but not a conspiracy.
Until I see frequent usage of the term that is both prior and “proper” (according to you) I don’t know what to think. What I DO know is that I have followed the news pretty closely for 35 years, and this is the FIRST time I have seen the word used frequently. I haven’t seen anything that would convince me that I’ve somehow managed to miss frequent and proper usage in the past.
Comment by TBlumer — September 5, 2005 @ 5:34 am
The term “refugee” is sometimes used as a derogatory term for Haitians in general…. Haitians = black, french, poor. New Orleanders = black, french, poor. Er……..
Comment by Pete D — September 5, 2005 @ 1:21 pm
No proof that its being used derogatory – but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck . . .
Comment by Pete D — September 5, 2005 @ 1:24 pm
I was surprised at the objection of Jessie Jackson, Oprah and others to the use of the word refugee. I looked in two of my dictionaries and found in both that the word simply means: one who flees for refuge or safety in times of war, persecution, disaster, etc.. It is taken from a French word refugier, borrowed from Latin refugere meaning:to flee. Nowhere does it mention anything about citizenship, or exile, financial status, race creed or color.
A refugee flees to a refuge. Refuge meaning, per the dictionary: shelter or protection from danger,trouble, etc..
This seems to have fit the people in New Orleans until the term evacuee took over when they were removed from the refuge to which they had fled. Evacuee meaning: A person who is removed to a place of greater safety.
The obvious difference being that a refugee does his own fleeing and an evacuee has help from someone else.
Comment by Lorraine — September 7, 2005 @ 11:55 am
#14, thanks for the comment.
As you can see from this post, I haven’t found in pretty detailed online dictionaries what you found in “your” dictionaries.
I think at a minimum a displaced person has to cross into another country, and has to have left with little anticipation of being able (even if not necessarily willing) to return. If you don’t have those two things, I think “evacuee” is better; I don’t agree that evacuees have “help” (an evacuation order is not “help) from someone else, as the vast majority of those who left the affected areas did so under their own power.
I think JJ and Oprah and others lodged a correct objection for the wrong reason. The word is incorrect because it’s gramatically incorrect, not because it has racist overtones. But if it makes newscasters and reporters reduce or eliminat their usage of the term, I’ll bite my tongue and take it.
Comment by TBlumer — September 7, 2005 @ 12:06 pm