First, watch the Crash Course video on the Industrial Revolution linked up here. Argue about whether or not he is a Euro-centrist on your own time.
Second. As John Green points out, for about 15,000 years of human history, little changed when it came to work. Who did it, how it was done, where it was done, all of that stayed the same. Everything people needed was crafted within walking distance of their homes. Specialized labor made it so that local needs were met by local people. Exceptions to this rule were luxury items like silks and porcelain, which were imported over great distances and, thus, were expensive luxury items. But even those were made by hand, by people (artisans) living in villages and towns. And a luxury good is something that people want, not exactly what people need. (An important distinction!)
So people worked from sunrise to sunset, generally on their own or with an apprentice or a partner. They mostly worked at home, or in a place really nearby to home (so as not to waste daylight hours walking). They were paid based on what they made. So shoe-makers didn’t get a daily wage, they got paid when the shoes were made or repaired, and the owner came to purchase them. Or when they dropped the shoes off at the person’s home on the way home from work.
The food they ate was grown/hunted/raised within a day’s journey of their house, though since you can dry apples, and you can make beef jerky, some food could be transported over longer distances. And for such items, there was someone in the town who owned a horse and cart, and who hired them out to travel to the larger town/city, where such items could be procured, and then be transported back to the village for the people to buy from him.
If we consider the earlier European “revolutions”: The Scientific Revolution, the Artistic Renaissance, The Reformation, The French Revolution, American Revolution, etc., has daily life really changed for the average person on the street? No. (Though, yes TJ, you could argue that the death and violence experienced by urban dwellers in the last two were an impact on daily life. Fine. Are the overall conditions of working different as a result? No. Moving on…)
So locally made/grown goods, sold in a local market, with the proceeds remaining local was the norm.
Then the Industrial Revolution happens. Suddenly goods are made by machines, in large quantities, in a factory, owned by a wealthy guy, far from home. Specialized labor is no longer needed. Electric lights mean the sun isn’t the master of the length of the workday. Goods can be transported large distances, and so can people...
On your blog, after you talk about this with the people around you, post a list of the changes to people’s lives that will come about as the result of the Industrial Revolution. By changing the very concept of work, how do the social, political, religious, and economic aspects of people’s lives change? How does the concept of the family change? How does the concept of “wealth” change?
Third, take a look at the Luddite response to the Industrial Revolution as described by Horrible Histories, linked up here.
In the same blog post, explain how does our discussion of the actual meaning of the words Radical, Liberal, Conservative and Reactionary help to describe why some responded to the Industrial Revolution in the way they did?
For homework, read pages 825 (Industrial Society) to page 833 (stop at the Socialist Challenge). We will discuss Utopian Socialists and their ideas tomorrow.
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