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Information about Manual Labour



Manual labour (or manual labor) is physical work done with the hands, especially in an unskilled job such as fruit and vegetable picking, road building, or any other field where the work may be considered physically arduous, and which has as a profitable objective, usually the production of goods.

In ancient times the status of manual labourers was low, as most physical tasks were done by slaves. Legal scholar L. Ali Khan analyzes how the Greeks, Hindus, the English, and the Americans created sophisticated social structures to outsource manual labor to distinct classes, castes, and races.[1] This continued into the feudal period. This modest position is still reflected in such professional designations as ranch hand or stage hand, where 'hand' (a pars pro toto for pair of hands, or rather for their owner) means an employee working in the named context. However, certain skilled labourers were seen as artisans, well-paid and could aspire to become influential citizens, especially via professional corporations. It was sometimes referred to as "pick and shovel work."

The phrase hard labour has even become a legal euphemism for penal labour, i.e. a custodial sentence during which the convict is not only confined but also put to manual work; such work may be productive, as on a prison farm, or intrinsically senseless, as with a Treadwheel, the only purpose being the (punishing, therapeutical..) effect of the punishment on the convict.

Beginning with the Industrial Revolution, though, the introduction of reliable machinery further lowered the status of labourers. The reduction in status led to the worldwide labour movements of the 19th and early 20th centuries, leading to the formation of trade unions. Further technological progress leads to an increasing segment of manual labour (generally using machinery) requiring more training or even theoretical insight.

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Employment is a contract between two parties, one being the employer and the other being the employee. An employee may be defined as: "A person in the service of another under any contract of hire, express or implied, oral or written, where the employer has
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A good or commodity in economics is any object or service that increases utility, directly or indirectly, not to be confused with good in a moral or ethical sense (see Utilitarianism and consequentialist ethical theory).
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Slavery is a social-economic system under which certain persons — known as slaves — are deprived of personal freedom and compelled to perform labour or services.
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17,000,000
Regions with significant populations
 Greece [1]
 United States
 Cyprus
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Hindu ( pronunciation   (help info ) , Devanagari: हिन्दु), as per modern definition, is an adherent of the philosophies and scriptures of Hinduism, and the
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English (from Old English Ænglisc) are a nation and ethnic group native to England and speak English. The largest single population of English people reside in England — the largest constituent country of the United Kingdom.
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Motto
"In God We Trust"   (since 1956)
"E Pluribus Unum"   ("From Many, One"; Latin, traditional)
Anthem
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Feudal society is a sometimes-debated term used to describe the social order in the Western Europe, Central Europe, and sometimes Japan and other regions in the Middle Ages, characterized by the legal subjection of a large part of the peasantry to a hereditary landholding elite
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A skill is the learnt capacity or talent to carry out pre-determined results often with the minimum outlay of time energy or both Examples include:
  • Academic skills
  • Reading

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artisan, also called a craftsman,[1] is a skilled manual worker who uses tools and machinery in a particular craft.

Artisans were the dominant producers of goods before the Industrial Revolution.
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Citizenship is membership in a political community (originally a city or town but now usually a country) and carries with it rights to political participation; a person having such membership is a citizen.
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Penal labour or penal servitude is a form of unfree labour. The term may refer to two different notions: labour as a form of punishment and labour as a form of occupation of convicts.
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Penal labour or penal servitude is a form of unfree labour. The term may refer to two different notions: labour as a form of punishment and labour as a form of occupation of convicts.
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A prison farm is a large correctional facility where hard labor convicts are put to economical use in a 'farm' (in the wide sense of a productive unit), usually for manual labour, largely in open air, such as in agriculture, logging, quarrying, etc.
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treadwheel is a form of animal engine powered by humans. It may resemble a water wheel in appearance, and can be worked either by a human treading paddles set into its circumference (a treadmill), or by a human standing inside it.
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Industrial Revolution was a period in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, and transportation had a profound effect on socioeconomic and cultural conditions in Britain and subsequently spread throughout the world, a process that
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The labour movement or labor movement is a broad term for the development of a collective organization of working people, to campaign in their own interest for better treatment from their employers and political governments, in particular through the implementation of
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For the periodical, see .
The 19th Century (also written XIX century) lasted from 1801 through 1900 in the Gregorian calendar. It is often referred to as the "1800s.
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twentieth century of the Common Era began on January 1, 1901 and ended on December 31, 2000, according to the Gregorian calendar. Some historians consider the era from about 1914 to 1991 to be the Short Twentieth Century.
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A trade union or labour union is an organization of workers. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members ("rank and file" members) and negotiates labor contracts with employers.
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Construction workers are employed in the construction industry and work predominately on construction sites and are typically engaged in aspects of the industry other than design or finance.
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Elbow grease is an old term for working hard at manual labour or trades, as in "put some elbow grease into that". It is also used as a practical joke by master tradesperson on apprentices - e.g. "Go fetch some elbow grease from him".
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Some types of work done by laborers:
  • concrete, shotcrete, gunite and grouting, steel concrete formwork
  • paving, white paving formwork, traffic control, striping (road surface marking), signs
  • piping-- waterpipe, sewer and storm drain

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Roughneck (or ruffneck) is a slang term for an unskilled or slightly skilled labourer in a number of industries. In particular, it is the official name of a semi-skilled role on a North American oil rig. In Australia, a roughneck is known as a Driller's Offsider.
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The Idler is a bi-yearly British magazine devoted to promoting its ethos of 'idle living' and all that entails. It was founded in 1993 with the intention of exploring alternative ways of working and living.
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The South African Wine Initiative is an organization that seeks to create global awareness of the exploitation of workers and environmental abuses as they allegedly relate to the South African wine industry and its practices.
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