You may not be surprised to learn that these words are complementary; they can refer to the same person, from two complementary points of view.
An emigrant is a person moving out of their country of residence, and an immigrant is a person coming into a new country for residence. The same difference is true for the verb pair emigrate/immigrate:
Only totalitarian countries restrict emigration, but many nations restrict immigration.
This should be easy to remember since the prefix e- usually means “out of” and the prefix im- is here a form of the prefix and preposition in.
Emigrate vs Immigrate
Emigrate and immigrate are the verb forms, and they maintain the same relation in meaning as their noun forms, as discussed in the previous section. The e- in emigrate stands for the prefix ex- and means out. And the im- in immigrate stands for the prefix in- and means in. So, emigrate means to migrate out of and immigrate means to migrate into:
When the economy gets bad, more people emigrate.
And it becomes more difficult to immigrate to wealthy nations.
More Examples of How to Use "Emigrant" in a Sentence
- The emigrants traveled across the vast ocean on a small boat.
- Most of the emigrants left England for economic reasons.
- The young emigrant, who was leaving Europe for the first time, was seasick the entire voyage.
- Despite the challenges, many people choose to emigrate in order to find a better life for themselves and their families.
- The process of emigration can be filled with challenges, especially if the individual is moving to a foreign country where they do not know the language or culture.
- The immigrants came over in the nineteenth century, emigrating from Scotland and Ireland, seeking work in America.
More Examples of How to Use "Immigrant" in a Sentence
- We need to make sure that the immigrants who come into this country have a better chance at improving their lives and communities.
- We're an immigrant family, and most of our family members still live back home.
- My mother is an immigrant from Spain; she came to this country when she was ten years old.
- Immigrants have always been a part of the United States.
- Some immigrants come to the United States to escape violence or poverty in their home countries.
- The immigrant community was known for its strong work ethic, which allowed them to quickly build wealth.