There’s nuance here: a peasant may have owned some land, but often not enough to live off of, which made them dependent on additional labour on the land of some landlord to supplement their own land’s harvest.
As I understand the term, it generally refers to the agricultural class in pre-industrial societies. I thought it obvious that this was the comparison made by the post. I’m not aware of any more modern application of the term aside from using it as an insult.
Okay, fair point, my use of the term is very eurocentric. I’ll concede my ignorance on the social structures in other parts of the world where the term may still apply.
As I read this:
First, those agrarian movements which
are done by the poor agriculture labourers and
marginal farmers, and these kinds of movements
are known as peasants movement.
That seems to include marrginal farmers, i.e. those with barely enough land to sustain their family, if that much. We’re back to my point: Peasants may have land, but not enough to qualify as landholders. The criterion is not whether they have any, but whether they have too little, which includes having none at all.
No they don’t. They’re landless labourers.
There’s nuance here: a peasant may have owned some land, but often not enough to live off of, which made them dependent on additional labour on the land of some landlord to supplement their own land’s harvest.
I recommend reading this historian’s analysis of life as a peasant.
Thanks for the recommendation but I’m pretty sure peasants still exist.
As I understand the term, it generally refers to the agricultural class in pre-industrial societies. I thought it obvious that this was the comparison made by the post. I’m not aware of any more modern application of the term aside from using it as an insult.
https://magazines.odisha.gov.in/Orissareview/2021/August/engpdf/page-56-60.pdf
Okay, fair point, my use of the term is very eurocentric. I’ll concede my ignorance on the social structures in other parts of the world where the term may still apply.
As I read this:
That seems to include marrginal farmers, i.e. those with barely enough land to sustain their family, if that much. We’re back to my point: Peasants may have land, but not enough to qualify as landholders. The criterion is not whether they have any, but whether they have too little, which includes having none at all.
Fair. In India, peasant usually refers to a farmer or agricultural labourer from the SC/ST communities.