Debt bondage

How it is used

Examine how debts and labour obligations were calculated; ordinary borrowing is not automatically bondage.

Example sentences

1. The account book helped explain how debt bondage tied families to the estate.

   The debt functions as a mechanism restricting departure.

2. The report distinguishes temporary loans from debt bondage.

   The key distinction is constrained labour, not simply owing money.

Common collocations

• a system of debt bondage
• escape debt bondage

Related terms

• slaveryA system in which people are legally owned by others, forced to work without pay and denied basic freedoms, or the condition of being enslaved.
• peasantA person who lives in the countryside and farms a small piece of land with family labour, often paying rent, taxes or labour services to a landowner or the state.

More terms: Social History

• feudalism
• aristocracy
• urbanization
• migration
• serf
• literacy
• social class
• corvée
• indentured servitude
• maroon community
• workhouse
• friendly society