What was the ratio of rural to urban population in England in 1750 and 1850? (State totals for both years)
How did life expectancy compare for farmers and city workers?
Excerpt one primary source that explains why people migrated to cities.
How should Parliament improve living conditions in cities?
Nobles evicted peasants from their land after the enclosure act forcing them to move to towns to find work in factories.
ReplyDelete1750: 20% urban - 80% rural http://www.slideshare.net/maggiesalgado/changes-in-britain-1750-1900
1850: Over 50% urban - less than 50% rural
http://www.ukagriculture.com/countryside/countryside_history_1850ad.cfm
Justify the nobles kicking peasants out of their land.
ReplyDeleteThe enclosure acts allowed nobles to have increased control of their land. In addition, new inventions were coming out that made farming more efficient and less labor intensive. The nobles could make more profits by working their own land now, and therefore did not need peasants to work their land. Additionally, having peasants work their land meant that the nobles had to share a portion of their profits. The nobles made peasants leave so that they could make more profits from their land themselves.
Defend urbanization as being beneficial for the population.
ReplyDeleteDefend urbanization as being detrimental for the population.
Urbanization was beneficial because people lived in close proximity allowing them to mingle more. Mingling allows ideas and knowledge to spread throughout a population. This allows for more inventions and innovations to emerge.
DeleteUrbanization was detrimental because living in close proximity means increased risk of disease. Before, if one person had a disease, then not many people would be infected, as humans lived farther apart. However, now, if one person is infected, then the entire town that they live with is now at risk of infection.
Poor working conditions, housing and sanitation caused many people to migrate. While others immigrated from villages to cities to find work, others moved in search for a better way of living. A visitor from Rotherham described the town as “[…] abominably filthy, the Steam Engine is pestiferous, the Dyehouses noisesome and offensive, and the water of the river as black as ink or the Stygian lake." (Visitor, Briggs, p. 89) An average home for the working class consisted of 6 people to a room, more than 2 of them with a fever, and up to 6 people sharing a bed- this included both children and adults. Alexis de Tocqueville was a French traveler and writer. He visited Manchester in 1835 and also commented on its environmental hazards. “From this foul Drain the greatest stream of human industry flows out to fertilize the whole world. From this filthy sewer pure gold flows. Here humanity attains its most complete development and its most brutish, here civilization works its miracles and civilized man is turned almost into a savage.” (Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution 44) The hazardous, unsanitary environment and lack of hygiene led to diseases such as cholera and typhoid. As cities continually grew in population, this problem only worsened.
ReplyDelete(Source: http://www2.uncp.edu/home/rwb/manchester_19c.html)
Explain why you think so many people would live in a single room, and how did these diseases affect the population
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletehttp://webs.bcp.org/sites/vcleary/ModernWorldHistoryTextbook/IndustrialRevolution/IREffects.html#Urbanization
ReplyDeleteParliament can improve living conditions by making the cities bigger so the working people would not be crowded and dirty. There was also a sewage problem inside England with the River Thames looking like “a fermenting sewer”. England was having a revolution but the people were in terrible working conditions as well as living conditions. They seemed to be prospering but were constrained by lack of space.
Question: Suppose that Parliament did make towns bigger. Would this affect the Industrial Revolution?
Answer: It would affect the Industrial Revolution because then there would be more space for more people to come and work. They would not be so cramped together in dirty streets and the landlords would come and enforce the rules and so there would be no overflowing sewage. There would be more fresh water to be separated among the people due to a massive amount of people dying from lack of water and possibly sewage poisoning due to the people in London drinking the River Thames, which was contaminated with sewage.
The average life expectancy of the rural citizen was around 45 years, while city life in England lasted around 37 years. This highlights the very high infant mortality rate and the complete incompetence of English doctors in this time. Leeches do not help cure things, contrary to the beliefs of these said doctors.. Around a third of babies died before the age of 5.
ReplyDeletehttp://webs.bcp.org/sites/vcleary/ModernWorldHistoryTextbook/IndustrialRevolution/IREffects.html
Question: Despite the shorter life expectancy, population of the world at this time rose drastically. Is it really better to have more people with shorter lives?
While the industrial revolution is praised for what it has given us, especially in a spike in the world population, it made the lives of the people in the cities miserable and short. In the long run, looking back, it seems great. But for all the people in between, the revolution wasn't the greatest event. The question of whether quantity of life is better than quality isn't really answerable, since the two are mutually exclusive, but since life expectancy after the industrial revolution slowly started rising again, the industrial revolution was all in all a good thing.
Suppose you were a farmer between the 1750s and the 1800s. Justify how much more you would have to work in order to provide for the rising population.
ReplyDeleteDuring this time period, the population had dramatically increased. At the same time, the number of farmers began decreasing due to the enclosure acts, nearly doubling the demand for natural resources. With the growing population, an average farmer may have had to work more hours and create faster and more efficient ways to grow and produce resources.