boat people

plural noun

1. refugees who have fled a country by boat, usually without sufficient provisions, navigational aids, or a set destination, especially those who left Indochina by sea as a result of the fall of South Vietnam in 1975.

boat people

plural noun

1. refugees, esp from Vietnam in the late 1970s, who leave by boat hoping to be picked up by ships of another country

Word History and Origins

Origin of boat people¹

First recorded in 1975–80

Example Sentences

But on Kouassi’s boat, “people died. And I was lucky to survive.”

From Seattle Times

On Jubair’s boat, people began to wail.

From Seattle Times

In a career that spanned five decades, she won renown for photos that captured the anguish of Vietnamese boat people on the South China Sea, the grit of a “girl boxer” from L.A.’s Eastside and the ferocity of a backboard-shattering dunk by a high school basketball player.

From Los Angeles Times

“This railing needs painting,” he said, walking into the branch, where he was greeted by senior librarian Juanita Carter and Lynn Nguyen, the daughter of Vietnamese boat people who this year was named one of Library Journal’s “Movers and Shakers.”

From Los Angeles Times

In interviews with hundreds of the refugees — “boat people,” as they were called, who had sought safety in the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Japan — Mr. Kamm wrote of the despair of men, women and children whose escape from probable death had led to ordeals of near starvation, terrors of drowning on the high seas and crushing rejection as the world turned them away.

From New York Times