INDUSTRIALISM: Goal for
today: Create a solid definition of industrialism and begin to consider some of
its implications.
Historian Lewis Mumford wrote that the crucial machine of the
machine age, both for its influence on technics and for its influence on the
habits of men, was ---
Has anyone seen a movie
lately? What time did it start?
What time does class
start?
Did anyone see the
final four games over the weekend? How long is a game? Who controls the clock?
The clock divides time
into precise intervals.
Time itself is a
social construction, a historical product.
There are two cultures
of time:
Monochronic
Cultures: (e.g. U.S., Northern Europe)
Time is a commodity,
rigid, meant to be used to complete one task at a time.
Polychronic
Cultures: (e.g. Latin America, Italy)
Time is more flexible, secondary to relationship.
Many tasks at a time.
Note the attitudes
towards time of the Kaabyle in Algeria:
"Haste is seen as
a lack of decorum combined with diabolical ambition…the notion of an exact
appointment is unknown; they agree only to meet at the next market.”
Pierre Bourdieu, Algeria 1960
“He
that idly loses five shillings' worth of time loses five shillings, and might
as prudently throw five shillings into the sea. He that loses five shillings,
not only loses that sum, but all the advantages that might be made by turning
it in dealing, which by the time that a young man becomes old, will amount to a
considerable sum of money.”
—Benjamin Franklin, 1736
Why
talk about cultural constructions of time while talking about industrialism?
What is the connection?
Industrialization and
globalization force a standardization of time.
(class starts at 1:00
and goes to 3:05, movies start at 2:05…these are tests of our ability to
standardize, to accept overly rigid organizational systems.)
DEFINE INDUSTRIALISM:
I will then give you
documents so that you can add evidence to your definition.
For now, start your
definition and explanation of industrialism with your neighbors.
Industrialism:
I. Power:
Thomas Newcomen (1702)
James Watt (1763)
II. Steel:
Britain: 1.3 million tons in 1840
6.7 million tons in 1870
10.4 million tons in 1913
Germany :
.19 million tons in 1840
1.56 million tons in 1870
19.3 million tons in 1913
III. The Factory System
A. Discipline: Adam Smith
Division of Labor
(Industrialism specializes)
DOCUMENT A: ELIZABETH
BENTLEY, EXAMINED BY SADLER COMMITTEE
(Commission for Inquiry
Into the Employment of Children in Factories. Second Report. 1833 )
What
age are you, -- Twenty-three. . . .
What time did you begin to work at a factory -- When I was six years old. . . .
What kind of mill is It., -- Flax-mill. . . .
What was your business in that mill, -- I was a little doffer(doffer= a worker, usually a young child, whose job was to clean the machines used in textile manufacturing. )
What were your hours of labor in that mill? -- From 5 in the morning till 9 at night, when they were thronged. (thronged=busy)
For how long a time together have you worked that excessive length of time, -- For about half a year.
What were your usual hours of labor when you were not so thronged? -- From 6 in the morning till 7 at night.
What time was allowed for your meals? -- Forty minutes at noon.
Had you any time to get your breakfast or drinking? -- No, we got it as we could.
And when your work was bad, you had hardly any time to eat it at all? -- No; we were obliged to leave it or take it home, and when we did not take it, the overlooker took it, and gave it to his pigs.
Do you consider doffing a laborious employment, -- Yes.
Explain what it is you had to do-, -- When the frames are full, they have to stop the frames, and take the flyers off, and take the full bobbins off, and carry them to the roller; and then put empty ones on, and set the frames on again.
Does that keep you constantly on your feet? -- Yes, there are so many frames and they run so quick.
Your labor is very excessive? -- Yes; you have not time for anything.
Suppose you flagged a little, or were too late, what would they do, -- Strap us.
Are they in the habit of strapping those who are last in doffing? -- Yes.
Constantly? -- Yes.
Girls as well as boys? -- Yes.
Have you ever been strapped? -- Yes.
Severely? -- Yes.
Could you eat your food well in that factory? -- No, indeed, I had not much to eat, and the little I had I could not eat it, my appetite was so poor, and being covered with dust; and it was no use to take it home, I could not eat it, and the overlooker took it, and gave it to the pigs . . .
Did you live far from the mill? -- Yes, two miles.
Had you a clock. -- No, we had not.
Supposing you had not been in time enough in the morning at the mills, what would have been the consequence? -- We should have been quartered.
What do you mean by that? -- If we were a quarter of an hour too late, they would take off half an hour; we only got a penny an hour, and they would take a halfpenny more. . . .
Were you generally there on time? -- Yes. my mother has been up at 4 o'clock in the morning, and at 2 o'clock in the morning; the colliers used to go to their work about 3 or 4 o'clock, and when she heard them stirring she has got up out of her warm bed, and gone out and asked them the time, and I have sometimes been at Hunslet Car at 2 o'clock in the morning, when it was streaming down with rain, and we have had to stay till the mill was opened . . . .
What time did you begin to work at a factory -- When I was six years old. . . .
What kind of mill is It., -- Flax-mill. . . .
What was your business in that mill, -- I was a little doffer(doffer= a worker, usually a young child, whose job was to clean the machines used in textile manufacturing. )
What were your hours of labor in that mill? -- From 5 in the morning till 9 at night, when they were thronged. (thronged=busy)
For how long a time together have you worked that excessive length of time, -- For about half a year.
What were your usual hours of labor when you were not so thronged? -- From 6 in the morning till 7 at night.
What time was allowed for your meals? -- Forty minutes at noon.
Had you any time to get your breakfast or drinking? -- No, we got it as we could.
And when your work was bad, you had hardly any time to eat it at all? -- No; we were obliged to leave it or take it home, and when we did not take it, the overlooker took it, and gave it to his pigs.
Do you consider doffing a laborious employment, -- Yes.
Explain what it is you had to do-, -- When the frames are full, they have to stop the frames, and take the flyers off, and take the full bobbins off, and carry them to the roller; and then put empty ones on, and set the frames on again.
Does that keep you constantly on your feet? -- Yes, there are so many frames and they run so quick.
Your labor is very excessive? -- Yes; you have not time for anything.
Suppose you flagged a little, or were too late, what would they do, -- Strap us.
Are they in the habit of strapping those who are last in doffing? -- Yes.
Constantly? -- Yes.
Girls as well as boys? -- Yes.
Have you ever been strapped? -- Yes.
Severely? -- Yes.
Could you eat your food well in that factory? -- No, indeed, I had not much to eat, and the little I had I could not eat it, my appetite was so poor, and being covered with dust; and it was no use to take it home, I could not eat it, and the overlooker took it, and gave it to the pigs . . .
Did you live far from the mill? -- Yes, two miles.
Had you a clock. -- No, we had not.
Supposing you had not been in time enough in the morning at the mills, what would have been the consequence? -- We should have been quartered.
What do you mean by that? -- If we were a quarter of an hour too late, they would take off half an hour; we only got a penny an hour, and they would take a halfpenny more. . . .
Were you generally there on time? -- Yes. my mother has been up at 4 o'clock in the morning, and at 2 o'clock in the morning; the colliers used to go to their work about 3 or 4 o'clock, and when she heard them stirring she has got up out of her warm bed, and gone out and asked them the time, and I have sometimes been at Hunslet Car at 2 o'clock in the morning, when it was streaming down with rain, and we have had to stay till the mill was opened . . . .
DOCUMENT B: Frank Forrest, The Life of a Dundee Factory Boy (1850)
“In reality there were no regular hours, masters
and managers did with us as they liked. The clocks in the factories were often
put forward in the morning and back at night.”
DOCUMENT C:
Honore-Antoine Fregier (Paris, 1840)
"The poor
and the vicious classes have been and will always be the most productive
breeding ground of evildoers of all sorts; it is they whom we shall designate
as the dangerous classes. For even when vice is not accompanied by perversity,
by the very fact that it allies itself with poverty in the same person, he is a
object of fear to society, he is dangerous."
DOCUMENT D: House of Commons, Lord Ashley, 9th
May, 1836
Dr. Loudon reports, "I am of the opinion no
child under fourteen years of age should work in a factory of any description
more than eight hours a day." Dr. Hawkins reports, "I am compelled to
declare my deliberate opinion, that no child should be employed in factory
labour below the age of ten; that no individual, under the age of eighteen,
should be engaged in it longer than ten hours daily."
Economic Factors of Class are Imprecise
Reign of Queen Victoria: 1837-1901
“The widest definition of the middle classes or
those who aspired to imitate them was that of keeping domestic servants.” Eric Hobsbawm
Alfred Lord Tennyson's immortal words convey the wife's task
to keep the household functioning smoothly and harmoniously: "Man for the
field, woman for the hearth, man for the sword and for the needle she; man with
the head and woman with the heart, man to command and woman to obey; all else
confusion."
“It is in the observation of little things ...
that one shows clearly one’s breeding or lack or it.”
Middle Class Attitudes:
Ø
Thrift
Ø
Moderation
Ø
“proper” manners
Ø
hard work (with the mind)
Ø
limited leisure time
Ø
separate spheres
Ø
personal security and prosperity is highest goal
Ø
key belief: individual success=success of
society
Ø
related key belief#1: competition will make you
your best, so the whole of society should be competitive
Ø
related key belief #2: government should keep
its grimy paws off of the economy so that the economy allows men a space for
healthy competition
"The majority of women (happily for them)
are not very much troubled with sexual feelings of any kind" - Dr. William
Acton
DOCUMENT E: Mrs.
Beeton's Book of Household Management
DOCUMENT
F: Two Marriage Manuals from the 19th C.
1. "Of
all these social, domestic, and personal obligations, her husband is the
centre; when they are properly discharged, his welfare and happiness are
certainly promoted; and his esteem, affection, and confidence established on a
permanent basis. In neglecting them he is neglected, his respectability
diminished, and his domestic peace and comfort destroyed."
2. "Wife's
principal duty was to raise the tone of her husband's mind and to lead his
thoughts to repose on those subjects which convey a feeling of identity with a
higher state of existence beyond this present life."
DOCUMENT G:
ADS
DOCUMENT H:
Women and Benevolence
"The poor
were the object of her affectionate interest, especially the shameful poor, the
fallen people. She sought them out and helped them with perfect discretion
which doubled the value of her benevolent interest. To those whom she could
approach without fear of bruising their dignity, she brought, along with alms
to assure their existence, consolation of the most serious sort - she raised
their courage and their hopes. To others each Sunday, she opened all the doors
of her home, above all when her children were still young. In making them
distribute these alms with her, she hoped to initiate them early into practices
of charity." Obituary of a French Middle Class woman Mme Emile
Delesalle
Industrialism and New Government Responses
--Welfare State Origins
--Sadler Committee: 1832 Tory MP Michael Sadler secured a
parliamentary
investigation
of conditions in the textile factories
--Representation of the People
Act of 1832
(aka Reform Bill)
“The first Reform Bill was necessitated
chiefly by glaring inequalities in representation between traditionally
enfranchised rural areas and the rapidly growing cities of newly industrial
England. For example, such large industrial centres as Birmingham and
Manchester were unrepresented, while parliamentary members continued to be
returned from numerous so-called “rotten boroughs,” which were virtually uninhabited rural districts, and
from “pocket boroughs,” where a single powerful landowner or peer could almost
completely control the voting. The sparsely populated county of Cornwall
returned 44 members, while the City of London, with a population exceeding
100,000, returned only 4 members.” http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/495344/Reform-Bill
--Poor Law Amendment Act
Created workhouses for the poor. Offered some schooling to the children
of the poor.
Reactions against this new set of laws…
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