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boat people

American

plural noun

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 British

plural noun

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

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of boat people

First recorded in 1975–80

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

The four people killed in the Cuban shootdown included two young men -- Carlos Costa and Mario de la Pena -- who only wanted to save boat people, said Gonzalez.

From Barron's • May 21, 2026

Let’s give British Jews the same chance America once gave Irish famine victims, Russian dissidents, Vietnamese boat people, and Afghan translators.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 26, 2025

She has first-hand experience, leaving Vietnam to the US in 1980 as part of the exodus of Vietnamese boat people.

From BBC • Jan. 5, 2025

In the following decades, thousands of Haitian "boat people" flee by sea to Florida, many dying on the way.

From Reuters • Jul. 7, 2021

Around me the newly arrived boat people talk excitedly to their friends and family, and deliver them news of relatives in Vietnam.

From "First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers" by Loung Ung

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023