People in UAE

Question

HiAny adjective or noun for people who live in UAE? And is it "UAE" or "the UAE"?Thanks,Tom

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

Mr. TomAny adjective or noun for people who live in UAE? And is it "UAE" or "the UAE"?

Arabic; Arab(s); the UAE.

(I assume you're referring to the United Arab Emirates, not Unemployed American Educators.

)

CJ

Mr. Tom · Answer

Thanks CJ,

... so am I to assume that there is no proper adjective/noun for people in the UAE, like Indians, Pakistanis, Americans, British, hongkongers, etc?

Thanks again,

Tom

CalifJim · Answer

Not that I know of. You don't like the proper noun ArabsI guess.

CJ

Mr. Tom · Answer

Isn't Arab too general, CJ? I mean, there are Arabs in Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait and many other countries.

Thanks,

Tom

CalifJim · Answer

I see what you mean, but I seriously doubt there's another term -- certainly not Emiratees.

On the other hand, Americans doesn't quite work either, because people from Canada, Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Bolivia, ... are all Americans. There is no word like Statesians to indicate those Americans who are from the United States. Similarly, there is no word like Kingdomers to indicate those who are from the United Kingdom -- another political entity that consists of subunits. You have this problem whenever a group of entities unite under a single title.

If you want more specific names, you'll have to use names derived from the seven emirates that comprise the group: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm al-Quwain, Ras al-Khaimah and Fujairah. I don't know the proper nouns that are used, but they may something like Dhabian, Dubaian, Sharjahian, Ajmani, or some such derived nouns. You would have to do some research on your own to find these if they are really important to you.

CJ

MrPedantic · Answer

CalifJimcertainly not Emiratees

I believe that's reserved for Arsenal supporters.

Kooyeen · Answer

I tried looking around on Wikipedia, out of curiousity, and I found this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emirati_people

It remains to be seen whether those terms are actually used by the press or anyone... But I tried googling "emiratis", and I found one example on the BBC website:
"But many Emiratis in Dubai feel the world's media and stock markets have over-reacted to the news."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8389168.stm

I always have problems with nationalities too... I wonder why I'm an Italian, but MrP isn't an English, and two people from France can't be two Frenches. And if people in France are "the French", why can't people in the US be "the American"?

Dictionaries sometimes can't help either:

Chinese - definition from Merriam Webster
1 a : a native or inhabitant of China b : a person of Chinese descent
2 : a group of related languages used by the people of China that are often mutually unintelligible in their spoken form but share a single system of writing and that constitute a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family; especially: mandarin
— Chinese adjective

They don't say it can also mean "the Chinese people", so the meaning used in the following example is not included: "The Chinese were the first Asian immigrants [...]" - Longman (for learners) includes that meaning though.

Universal solution: Say <country adjective> people, or people from <country>

[Y]

Orpheus · Answer

The OED lists 'Emirian' as the adjective for the UAE. I suppose 'the Emirians' could be used to refer to the people from the UAE?

People in UAE

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