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History vocabulary · Revolutions and Political Change

Luddism

Meaning in history, with examples

nounCommon term

In history, Luddism means: The movement associated with English textile workers who broke machinery during early nineteenth-century labour conflicts.

In Turkish: Ludizm

How it is used

Historical Luddism involved livelihoods and working arrangements; do not reduce it to dislike of all technology.

Example sentences

  1. The wage records place Luddism within disputes over skilled textile work.

    Economic conflict helps explain the targeting of machinery.

  2. The historian challenged the use of Luddism as a synonym for ignorance.

    A later insult can obscure the movement's historical setting.

Common collocations

  • the history of Luddism
  • Luddite protest
  • industrializationThe process by which an economy shifts from mainly farming and handicrafts to large-scale manufacturing in factories using machines.
  • uprisingAn act of resistance in which a group of people rise up against those in power, usually in a particular region or city and often with few weapons.

More terms: Revolutions and Political Change

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