coolie

coolie
/kooh"lee/, n. Offensive.
1. an unskilled laborer, esp. formerly in China and India.
2. an unskilled laborer employed cheaply, esp. one brought from Asia.
adj.
3. Informal. characteristic of or suitable for a coolie: working for coolie wages.
Also, cooly.
[1545-55; < Urdu kuli < Tamil kuli hire, hireling]

* * *

▪ Asian labourer
      (from Hindi Kuli, an aboriginal tribal name, or from Tamil kuli, “wages”), in usually pejorative European usage, an unskilled labourer or porter usually in or from the Far East hired for low or subsistence wages.

      The so-called coolie trade began in the late 1840s as a response to the labour shortage brought on by the worldwide movement to abolish slavery. The majority of these contract labourers were shipped from China, especially from the southern ports of Amoy and Macao, to developing European colonial areas, such as Hawaii, Ceylon, Malaya, and the Caribbean.

      Most coolies became so by voluntary negotiation, though kidnapping, decoy, and fraud were occasionally involved. Western merchants conducted the trade. Conditions in the depots (barracoons), where the labourers were stored awaiting shipment, and on the vessels in which they sailed were cramped and inhumane, resulting in much sickness, misery, and death. Neither the Western governments nor the Chinese government made more than a haphazard attempt to correct the abuses; the Chinese government had issued a ban on all emigration, but officials did nothing to enforce it.

      By the late 19th century, free immigration began to supersede the coolie trade. The Chinese, Japanese, and Hindustani workers who came to Australia and California after the discovery of gold in these areas around 1850 were commonly regarded as coolies, but they were technically free immigrants, not contract labourers.

* * *


Universalium. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Нужно решить контрольную?

Look at other dictionaries:

  • coolie — [ kuli ] n. m. • 1843; couli 1791; coly 1666; p. ê. empr. à un parler hindi par l interm. de l angl. ♦ Travailleur, porteur chinois ou hindou. Des coolies. ⊗ HOM. Coulis. ● coolie nom masculin (mot anglais du gujarātī kūlī, nom d une peuplade de… …   Encyclopédie Universelle

  • Coolie — (également Cooly, Kuli, Quli, Koelie, etc.) est un terme désignant au XIXe siècle les travailleurs agricoles d origine asiatique. Le mot est aujourd hui employé dans les pays anglophones dans un sens péjoratif. Sommaire 1 Étymologie 2 Historique… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Coolie No. 1 — (Hindi) Directed by David Dhawan Produced by Vashu Bhagnani Ramesh Sadhuram Taurani Written by Rumi Jaffery Kader Khan Starring …   Wikipedia

  • Coolie No. 1 — Coolie N°1 est un film indien réalisé par David Dhawan sorti en 1995. C est une comédie dont les rôles principaux sont tenus par Govinda et Karisma Kapoor. Synopsis Hoshiyar Chand humilie Shaadikar Gharjode alors que ce dernier se fait le porte… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Coolie — Coo lie, n. Same as {Cooly}. [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • coolie — (ingl.; pronunc. [cúli]) m. Culi …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • coolie — → culi o culí …   Diccionario panhispánico de dudas

  • coolie — (n.) name given by Europeans to hired laborers in India and China, c.1600, from Hindi quli hired servant, probably from kuli, name of an aboriginal tribe or caste in Gujarat. The name was picked up by the Portuguese, who used it in southern India …   Etymology dictionary

  • coolie — /ingl. ˈkuːlɪ/ [vc. ingl., dall indostano kulī, n. di una popolazione indiana] s. m. inv. (in Estremo Oriente) servitore, portatore …   Sinonimi e Contrari. Terza edizione

  • coolie — ► NOUN (pl. coolies) 1) dated an unskilled native labourer in India, China, and some other Asian countries. 2) offensive a person from the Indian subcontinent or of Indian descent. ORIGIN from a Hindi word meaning day labourer …   English terms dictionary

  • coolie — [ko͞o′lē] n. [Hindi qulī, hired servant, prob. < kolī, name of a tribe or caste of Gujarat] 1. an unskilled native laborer, esp. formerly, in India, China, etc. 2. a person doing heavy labor for little pay …   English World dictionary

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”