The Moral and Physical Condition of the Working Classes Employed in the Cotton Manufacture of Manchester


Book Description

This book was originally published in 1832. Dr. James Philips Kay (later Sir James Kay Shuttleworth) studied medicine in Edinburgh and then began to practise in Manchester where he acquired a wide knowledge of working-class conditions and diseases. In 1831-2 he acted as secretary to the Manchester Board of Health which was set up to combat the threatened cholera epidemic, and it is thanks in part to the devoted labours of Kay and his colleagues that the epidemic in Manchester was less severe than in other cities. This vividly written pamphlet embodies the fruits of Kay Shuttleworth's experiences in the capital of the cotton kingdom. He describes the newly set up Boards of Health investigatings into the state of Manchester's poor, and enumerates the causes of their physical depression, with all its attendant moral degradation and predisposition to disease. As well as supplying statistics for pauperism, crime and mortality, Shuttleworth provides suggestions for improving working class conditions. This is the best known of all the literature produced about workers' ocnditions in the early nineteenth century, and is a work which has been widely quoted and used by both economic and social historians.




The Family Economy of the Working Classes in the Cotton Industry, 1784-1833


Book Description

UK. Historical study of family budgets and family economy of cotton textile workers of the textile industry - child labour, the woman worker employed to work at home, cost of living, living conditions, family wages earnings, apprentices, the effect of industrialization, etc.




The Condition of the Working-Class in England In 1844


Book Description

From 1842 to 1844, German philosopher FRIEDRICH ENGELS (1820-1895) lived in Manchester, England, and witnessed firsthand the impact of the nation's burgeoning Industrial Revolution on the poor. In this classic treatise, Engels documents, in what is today his best-known work, the terrible working conditions, rampant disease, overcrowded housing, child labor, and other horrors of the time. Originally intended for a German audience and translated for American readers in 1885 by American socialist, suffragette, and civil rights activist FLORENCE KELLEY WISCHNEWETZKY (1859-1932), this work has never been out of print. It remains a startling record of the era, and is must-reading for anyone wishing a deeper understanding of Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto, which Engels collaborated on with his friend only a few years later.




The Making of the English Working Class


Book Description

This account of artisan and working-class society in its formative years, 1780 to 1832, adds an important dimension to our understanding of the nineteenth century. E.P. Thompson shows how the working class took part in its own making and re-creates the whole life experience of people who suffered loss of status and freedom, who underwent degradation and who yet created a culture and political consciousness of great vitality.




The Condition Of The Working-Class In England In 1844


Book Description

"The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844" by Frederick Engels is a powerful indictment of the Industrial Revolution's detrimental impact on workers. Engels meticulously demonstrates how industrial cities like Manchester and Liverpool experienced alarmingly high mortality rates due to diseases, with workers being four times more likely to succumb to illnesses like smallpox, measles, scarlet fever, and whooping cough compared to their rural counterparts. The overall death rate in these cities far surpassed the national average, painting a grim picture of the workers' plight. Engels goes beyond mortality statistics to shed light on the dire living conditions endured by industrial workers. He argues that their wages were lower than those of pre-industrial workers, and they were forced to inhabit unhealthy and unpleasant environments. Addressing a German audience, Engels' work is considered a classic account of the universal struggles faced by the industrial working class. It reveals his transformation into a radical thinker after witnessing the harsh realities in England. "The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844" remains an essential resource for understanding the hardships endured by workers during the Industrial Revolution. Engels' meticulous research and impassioned arguments continue to shape discussions on labor rights, social inequality, and the historical agency of the working class.




The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 with a Preface written in 1892


Book Description

The Condition of the Working Class in England is a book by philosopher Friedrich Engels. Essentially a study of the industrial working class in England, the author argues that the Industrial Revolution made workers worse off.




The Letters of Charlotte Brontë: 1848-1851


Book Description

In this volume we share Charlotte Bronte's experience for four crucial years. The success of Jane Eyre and the strange power of Wuthering Heights made the 'brothers Bell' the 'universal theme of conversation'; but privately the family endured the deaths of Branwell Bronte in September andEmily in December 1848, followed by Anne's in May 1849. Haunted by the fear that she also would succumb, Charlotte found salvation in writing Shirley, published in October 1849, and comfort in her friendship and correspondence with Ellen Nussey, with her publishers-especially George Smith-with MrsGaskell, and (for a time) Harriet Martineau. She may also have received a proposal of marriage from Smith, Edler's manager, James Taylor.




Storied Ground


Book Description

People have always attached meaning to the landscape that surrounds them. In Storied Ground Paul Readman uncovers why landscape matters so much to the English people, exploring its particular importance in shaping English national identity amid the transformations of modernity. The book takes us from the fells of the Lake District to the uplands of Northumberland; from the streetscapes of industrial Manchester to the heart of London. This panoramic journey reveals the significance, not only of the physical characteristics of landscapes, but also of the sense of the past, collective memories and cultural traditions that give these places their meaning. Between the late eighteenth and early twentieth centuries, Englishness extended far beyond the pastoral idyll of chocolate-box thatched cottages, waving fields of corn and quaint country churches. It was found in diverse locations - urban as well as rural, north as well as south - and it took strikingly diverse forms.




The Return of Nature


Book Description

Winner, 2020 Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize A fascinating reinterpretation of the radical and socialist origins of ecology Twenty years ago, John Bellamy Foster’s Marx’s Ecology: Materialism and Nature introduced a new understanding of Karl Marx’s revolutionary ecological materialism. More than simply a study of Marx, it commenced an intellectual and social history, encompassing thinkers from Epicurus to Darwin, who developed materialist and ecological ideas. Now, with The Return of Nature: Socialism and Ecology, Foster continues this narrative. In so doing, he uncovers a long history of the efforts to unite questions of social justice and environmental sustainability, and helps us comprehend and counter today’s unprecedented planetary emergencies. The Return of Nature begins with the deaths of Darwin (1882) and Marx (1883) and moves on until the rise of the ecological age in the 1960s and 1970s. Foster explores how socialist analysts and materialist scientists of various stamps, first in Britain, then the United States, from William Morris and Frederick Engels, to Joseph Needham, Rachel Carson, and Stephen J. Gould, sought to develop a dialectical naturalism, rooted in a critique of capitalism. In the process, he delivers a far-reaching and fascinating reinterpretation of the radical and socialist origins of ecology. Ultimately, what this book asks for is nothing short of revolution: a long, ecological revolution, aimed at making peace with the planet while meeting collective human needs.