Emigrant vs Immigrant: Looking Backwards to Look Forward

“Mama, you’re an immigrant” said my eight year old. We had just watched Hamilton on stage after listening to the soundtrack on repeat for many months. It had never occurred to me to describe myself as an immigrant before. The famous lyrics

“Immigrants (We Get the Job Done)”

mainly remind me of current US political fighting and families pulled apart at borders. Other people. Not me. 

I was curious about the etymology of emigrant vs immigrant and figured that it was likely due to differences in British vs Americanisms. I was wrong and learned that they mean the same thing, but vary depending on whether you’re talking about the country you came from or the one you’re going to. Immigrant looks forward to the country you’re going to and emigrant looks back at the country you came from. For example:

Alexander Hamilton immigrated to the United States

Alexander Hamilton emigrated from the Caribbean island of Nevis

Thinking back to my childhood moving to a new country every 3–4 years and then to the US for college and my working life, I realized that I mostly look forward. I make my plans for our next vacation, think about my personal goals, create my business plan, and have hopes & dreams for my children. Often, I forget to look back to see where I’ve come from and see how it has inexplicably affected my view on the world. 

Looking Back on Design

In product design, we always start with a look back to the visual styles, existing patterns, typical user understanding, and the product decisions that have led us to the system we have today. 

“Good artists copy, great artists steal” — Steve Jobs (or Pablo Picasso?)

Designers are aware of the current aesthetic of the past few years. They seek to emulate it, perhaps to make sure that their apps play well with Apple’s former skeuomorphic style or feel more modern with card-based interfaces and material design’s newer inspiration from the physical world. If we’re looking even further backwards, digital metaphors often arise from the physical world. The physical world gave us icons of gears (settings), envelopes (email), and bells (notifications). 

Working on innovation teams within Facebook product design, we urged the designers on our teams to internalize the Facebook style guide and be familiar with existing patterns on the app. If 80% of the pattern will fit the new use case you were designing for, then strongly consider using the existing pattern to minimize new mental load on the user and to ship it faster using pre-built components. However, always keep exploring and knowing what inspiration can be taken from the strengths and limitations of the existing pattern to solve new use cases or simply to explore a nifty new pattern that’s just cool. Know the past, know what exists and use it as as a springboard to create new and more innovative designs. 

Questions to help understand a product’s past:

  • Why did the product team at the time make those decisions? What were the trade-offs?

  • What was happening in that time period, either culturally, economically or with competitors, to serve as context for the launch?

  • With the benefit of hindsight, what worked well and what went terribly wrong?

  • Regardless of success or failure, what was new and innovative about the design?

  • What parts of the design have successfully stood the test of time to become classic elements?

Immigrant / Emigrant in my Life

Today, I’m writing this from Bangkok. My trips home this year have been to mourn and also to celebrate with family. I’ve realized that I come from a family of immigrants with grandparents on both sides coming to Thailand from China and Hong Kong. 

I’ve realized more that my past is part of who I am. It informs how exist in the world and make decisions. Parts of my personality that I’d singularly claimed, have mainly been learned from examples through my youth. 

  • Ask for forgiveness not permission
    You would assume that Asian cultures foster an atmosphere of asking for permission. That’s certainly been the case for me with my family as well as parts of my schooling. However, I have a fierce rebel streak that could be born from seeing examples through childhood of family breaking the rules, with perhaps an entitlement of being beyond the rules. Perhaps it’s from a non-understanding (as an immigrant) or a non-caring because the new situation’s rules feel arbitrary.

  • Adventure & Entrepreneurship
    My dad was a lifelong employee of Thai Airways. He took that job as an avenue for him to see the world. My parents met when my mom was employed by Air France, also as a pathway to adventure. At Thai Airways, my dad was their “growth guy” who would be the founding station manager in a new country to see if it would be a viable route for the airline. Growing up, we moved to a different country every 3–4 years. They were always able to figure it out and make things work everywhere we moved.

  • Communal Generosity (over food)
    My family eats together. We plan the next meal while we are consuming the current one. The most intense debates occur over the quality of the food and where to go to find the best xiao long bao or rich chocolate cake. There are no boundaries over whose plate is whose–any food on the table is considered to be communal. And similarly, there is no splitting of bills. Someone always pays in the spirit of generosity, as thankfulness that we have shared this experience together.

  • Service-oriented
    Our family is Buddhist. Despite any pettiness and complaints about each other, service to the family comes first. Family is there to celebrate together, and to mourn together, each person playing a crucial role in the ceremonies. My grandfather was a doctor. He was a medic in China in WWII and when coming back to Bangkok had his own private practice serving many that were less fortunate. Service can be direct or non-direct, but ultimately that desire to help others near and far is the root of most activity.

Questions to help understand your own past:

  • What unique truths do you hold that originated with your culture or family?

  • Why have you chosen your past jobs and how has that led you to today?

  • What prompted you to choose what to study?

  • What are you proudest of?

  • What stories are part of your family lore of shared history?

  • What are your peak experiences from childhood or student days, either positive or negative? How do they affect your decision-making today?

Today, I am more mindful of what has come before. Of what family lore and generational trauma as immigrants has crept into my relationship with foundational concepts like financial stability and security. Of what product questions have been considered before that will inform the new experiences we are building. Becoming closer to what has come before provides a richer tapestry and foundation for the future. 

Tutti Taygerly