Word of the Day

: November 20, 2020

emigrate

verb EM-uh-grayt

What It Means

: to leave one's place of residence or country to live elsewhere

emigrate in Context

"… graduates and skilled technical workers are also emigrating, usually with a plan to save up for a few years and then return." — The Economist, 5 Nov. 2013

"Vuong's parents emigrated by boat from Vietnam five years earlier and settled in Modesto." — Marijke Rowland, The Modesto (California) Bee, 10 Oct. 2020

Did You Know?

Migrate, emigrate, and immigrate are all about being on the move. The source of all three is the Latin word migrare, which means "to move from one place to another." Emigrate and immigrate sound alike, and both involve leaving one location and arriving in another, but they are applied differently: emigrate stresses leaving the original place, while immigrate focuses on arriving in the new one. You won't have trouble keeping them straight if you remember that the prefix e- means "away," as in eject, and the prefix im- or in- means "into," as in inject.