ABSTRACT
This chapter explores that anthropologists have in the meantime begun to study people of their own colour; expatriates have remained curiously absent from academic accounts. This relative academic invisibility contrasts with their prominence in the popular imagination, even though this often takes the form of caricatures and clichs. The term expatriate' is a loose one and has multiple meanings; he do not attempt to systematically review them here, but discuss only those that are relevant in the present context. The chapter examines the current, technical meaning of the term expatriates' is employed within the field of international human resource management. In this context, an expatriate is someone who takes up an international assignment for their current employer. The basis for such reasoning is what could be called a hardship ideology', which also underpins the expatriate package' described earlier. One element of this is the concept of expatriation as a state of deprivation, including the idea of a hardship' post.
