Work and unemployment, 1834-1911. Volume 1, The meanings of work

Throughout the entire period covered by this collection, in order to receive assistance when unemployed (whether through the Poor Law or government public works or unemployment insurance), people (men, most often) had to have a positive relationship to paid employment. This is the subject of Proposed Solutions to Unemployment. In "Back to the Land and Labour Colonies," the sources explore various efforts to train urban unemployed men in agricultural work. Similarly, "Emigration and Empire" looks at the ways that private societies and local and central government bodies promoted emigration schemes to send unemployed men to colonies that could use their work. "The Right to Work" changes perspective, focusing on the demands of labour and unemployed groups who made arguments that unemployed men should be given work or maintained at a level that equalled their pay. The collection finishes with "The Unemployed Workman’s Act and Unemployment Insurance," which shows that even with the promise of national government action, the moralizing language of blaming the unemployed for their condition remained. Cover Half Title Title Copyright Contents Acknowledgments Bibliography General introduction Volume 1 Introduction Part 1 The respectability of honest toil 1 W. Cobbett, ‘To the Labourers of England, on Their Duties and Their Rights’ (1831) 2 J. Livesey, ‘An Address to Working Men’ (1838) 3 J. F. Bray, Labour’s Wrongs and Labour’s Remedy (1839) 4 Anon., ‘The Production and Distribution of Wealth’ (1840) 5 J. Adshead, Distress in Manchester: Evidence (Tabular and Otherwise) of the State of the Labouring Classes in 1840–42 (1842) 6 The British Workman on the nobility of labour 6.1 M. Howitt, ‘Labourer’s Thanksgiving Hymn’, British Workman (1856) 6.2 Rev N. Hall, ‘The Dignity of Labour’, British Workman (1856) 6.3 ‘No. I. – The Working Man’, British Workman (1859) 7 Rev. A. Oxenden, ‘The Labourer at His Work’, in The Labouring Man’s Book (1860) 8 Dr J. C. Hall, The Trades of Sheffield . . . Read before the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, 2nd ed. (1865) 9 J. B. Glasier, ‘Honest Toil’ (c. 1890) 10 G. Milligan, ‘A Man and His Work’, ‘Only a Working Man’, and ‘The Toiler’s Toast’, in Life Through Labour’s Eyes (1911) Part 2 Men and machines 11 Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, The Working Man’s Companion: The Results of Machinery . . . An Address to Working Men (1831) 12 Anon., The Petition of the Undersigned Operative Spinners and Others Employed in the Spinning of Cotton Wool into Yarn, in Ashton-under-Lyne and Its Neighbourhood (1832) 13 G. C. Burrows, ‘Introduction’, ‘Letter I’, ‘Letter VI’, and ‘Appendix’ in A Word to Electors. Letters to the Present Generation on the Unrestrained Use of Modern Machinery Particularly Addressed to my Countrymen and Fellow Citizens (1832) 14 Debating political economy and the condition of the handloom weavers 14.1 G. P. Scrope, The Letter of George Poulett Scrope, Esq., M.P., to the Chairman of the Central Committee of the Hand Loom Worsted Weavers, of the West-Riding of York: With Their Answer to the Same (1835) 14.2 J. Dewhirst, ‘To George Poulett Scrope, Esq., M.P.’, Poor Man’s Guardian , 1 August 1835 15 J. Maxwell, Manual Labour versus Machinery (1834) 16 Anon., ‘The Present Condition of British Workmen’ (1834) 17 H. Leggeth and S. Cowle, ‘The Address of the Female Chartists of Manchester to Their Sisters of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales’ (24 July 1841) 18 W. Carpenter, ‘The Question of Machinery Fairly Stated’, ‘Machinery Creates a Demand for Manual Labour’, and ‘Condition of the Hand-Loom Weavers’, in Machinery as It Affects the Industrial Classes and the Employment of Children in Factories (1844) 19 Literary depictions of mechanization 19.1 C. Dickens, chapter 5 ‘The Key-Note’, Hard Times (1854) 19.2 B. Brierley, ‘Out of Work’, in Tales and Sketches of Lancashire Life (1885) 20 J. Samuelson, ‘Introductory’, ‘The Displacement of Hand-Labour in Agriculture’, ‘Displacement of General Labourers by Machinery’, and ‘Inferences – The General Question of Labour – Conclusion’, in Labour-Saving Machinery (1893) Part 3 Women’s work: productive and reproductive 21 J. Livesey, ‘To the Females Employed in Factories and All Our Large Manufacturing Establishments’ (1 February 1832) 22 Chartist women 22.1 Anon., ‘Miss Mary Anne Walker on the People’s Charter’, Northern Star (1842) 22.2 S. Price, ‘Address of the Female National Charter Association of Upper Honley and Smallthorn’ (1842) 23 Reports of Special Assistant Poor Law Commissioners on the Employment of Women and Children in Agriculture (1843) 24 E. Copley, ‘Introduction’ to The Young Women of the Factory, or Friendly Hints on Their Duties and Dangers (c. 1840) 25 Anon., ‘Female Education and Female Labour’ (1845) 26 M. F. Tupper, ‘The Workwoman’, in A Dozen Ballads for the Times about White Slavery (1854) 27 Sentimental Depictions of Working-class Women in the British Workman 27.1 Anon., ‘A Few Words to the Wives of Working Men’, British Workman (1856) 27.2 Anon., ‘Finery and Freedom, or “Lucy’s Choice”’, British Workman (1858) 28 A. Munro, ‘Our Unemployed Females, and What May Best Be Done for Them’ in Transactions of the Manchester Statistical Society (1863) 29 T. Wright, ‘Working Men’s Homes and Wives’, in The Great Unwashed (1868) 30 J. B. Kinnear, ‘The Social Position of Women in the Present Age’, in The Right of Women to Labour (1873) 31 M. Harkness, ‘Palm-Workers’, in Toilers in London; or Inquiries Concerning Female Labour in the Metropolis (1889) 32 G. Reid et al., ‘Legal Restraint upon the Employment of Women in Factories before and after Childbirth’ (30 July 1892) 33 Anon., ‘Health of Lead Workers’ (December 1893) 34 E. Dilke, ‘Preface’, in A. Bulley and M. Whitley, Women’s Work (1894) 35 H. Bosanquet, Economics of Women’s Work and Wages (1907) Index This volume includes primary sources that identify "The Long History Toil," which demonstrate that vagrancy and idleness went against constructions of the English, then British, character. While the state as early as Tudor times made provision to assist unemployed persons, in order to receive assistance, the unemployed (and particularly men) had to physically labor for that help. The section "Work, Class, and Identity," continues this theme with different types of sources, examining some classic texts that defined the meanings of work for Victorians, such as Thomas Carlyle's essay where he talks about the "Gospel of Work," and Samuel Smiles's "Self Help." The section will also include some more obscure writings that explain how poor people thought about work in comparison to these more elite texts. The first two sections in this volume firmly establish the work imperative as fundamental to understandings of work and unemployment. "Men's Work and Women's Work" will explore the gendered nature of work and the ways the moral considerations attached to work applied differently to men and women. Women, because their primary role in the era was reproductive, had a different relationship to paid employment. Unpaid employment in the home was also expected of women in ways that it was not for men, and paid employment was never core to feminine identity for women like it was to masculine identity for men This collection focuses on work and unemployment in the lives of working-class Britons from 1824 (the Vagrancy Act) to 1911 (the National Insurance Act). The collection is framed around what "the work imperative" - the expectation that able-bodied men, to fit into the dominant construction of masculinity and demonstrate their worthiness, had an obligation to work for pay. This gendered conception of work had significant implications for understandings and experiences of unemployment. Throughout the period these volumes address that being out of work was seen as a problem almost exclusively for men (even if women were mentioned in legislation or policies) because of their assumed primary roles as breadwinners and providers. The collection explores power relations between unemployed people and those with the ability to provide assistance to them, and the continuing struggles over the meanings of work and unemployment This volume examines the ideals and experiences of work during the long nineteenth century. The meanings attached to work had resonance in multiple aspects of people's lives, and the sources consider this breadth. The primary sources examine the association of work with respectability, the challenges industrialization posed to men's traditional labour and identities, and the pressures placed on working women by the increasingly normative domestic ideal. Accompanied by extensive editorial commentary, this volume will be of great interest to students of British History. This volume explores questions surrounding what types of assistance were available to people out of work and who should receive that assistance during the nineteenth century. Accompanied by extensive editorial commentary, this volume will be of great interest to students of British History. This four-volume collection explores the relationships between work and unemployment through nineteenth-century primary sources. Accompanied by extensive editorial commentary, this collection will be of great interest to students of British History.