Refugees? Asylees? Migrants? Illegals? Lots of us are getting some basics about the Central American caravan wrong; tweets and images go viral and we’re not necessarily better informed as a result. I think this says a lot about who gets to be fully human in society. A thread.
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It’s not necessarily by design that we don’t have a perfect term, but Central Americans fleeing persecution isn’t new. If language reflects culture then we live in a culture where we have no term to describe *generations* of brown people fleeing state violence in groups.
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As I explained earlier, immigrants/migrants are incorrect terms here, both for practical and legal reasons. The most incorrect term? “Illegals.” Coming to a port-of-entry and asking for asylum is legal. Doing so is recognized by domestic and international law. Period.
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More than anything else (and for journalists especially since that’s whose getting a lot of this stuff wrong!) be conscious of the words you’re using and what they mean. For more on this, I suggest following scholar
@AbregoLeisy and my homie (and also a scholar)@PalmTreesnGz.Show this thread
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