Call migrants by their true name — Immigrants

"What's in a name?" Shakespeare's Juliet asks, making the point that what matters is a person's essence, not what we call them.

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That's true in love. In politics, not so much. People entering the US at our southern border are now routinely called a name migrant - that is contributing to the nation's toxic political discourse. The term is used not only by conservative commentators, but also in the pages of the New York Times and most other media outlets, including Bloomberg. Few names are as central to American identity as the one that migrant has replaced: immigrant. The latter carries a certain national nobleness. It conjures images of the Statue of Liberty, of dreamers and strivers who arrive with nothing but courage and ambition. Many of us proudly tell the stories of our immigrant forebearers.

The word migrant, on the other hand, evokes roaming bands of people, who, like the Roma in Europe and the Travellers in Ireland, have historically faced discrimination and prejudice as a separate and lesser class - one to be wary of, that doesn't fit in and that can be scapegoated. Calling today's arrivals migrants severs their connection to Americans who built the nation. It deprives them of the dignity the term confers on earlier generations. It makes it harder for all of us with immigrant ancestors to recognize our own family stories in theirs. And therein lies the real problem.