Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Demanding great exertion; arduous and exhausting.
Wiktionary
- adj. figuratively Of work, very physically tiring.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. characterized by effort to the point of exhaustion; especially physical effort
Etymologies
- back + breaking, that is, that breaks the back (Wiktionary)
Examples
“To create intrigue and start a conversation amongst city folk stimulating awareness about where veggies come from and the men and women who engage in backbreaking work to grow them.”
“They had taken on a job that is accurately described as backbreaking.”
“The slim, handsome woman vividly recalls the backbreaking work from sunrise to sunset clearing forests, digging irrigation canals and planting rice; hunting for frogs, rats and snakes to eat; seeing corpses piled high on oxcarts rumbling off to mass graves; her son dying on a garbage heap as he rummaged for fish bones to eat.”
“People marvel that anyone could ever have done it at all, and describe the work as "drudgery" and "backbreaking" - which may be true - the guys digging the outhouses may well have hated it, and may well have preferred their new jobs, unloading pallets at Walmart to digging outhouses.”
“When you put that kind of backbreaking work into changing the narrative of American history -- as Russert and the others did -- you expect to see results from it.”
John Eskow: Tuesday's Biggest Loser: Tim Russert (And All The Other TV Blowhards)
“The thing that tipped it into "backbreaking" was the 5 pound roll of wrapping paper I slid into the basket at the last minute!”
“But my goal as an interviewer is to steer them off the track, ideally through questions that the others arenât likely to ask probably because most journalists donât even bother to read the books or do the kind of backbreaking research that I do…….”
“Liss pointed to a "backbreaking" low post move by Shawn Stephan PO '11 as one of the important moments of the second half.”
“Thompson did the kind of backbreaking work that most Americans wouldn't think of doing.”
“Everybody in the plant would have liked that, because, you know, it would have given people a break on that kind of backbreaking work on a meatpacking line.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘backbreaking’.
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back phrases/hyphens/compounds
backache to backyard
back-ache, back-aching, back-acter, back-acting, back-answer, back-bar, back-basket, back beat, back-bias, back-blast, back-blowing, back-boiler and 342 more...
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Body Participles
Words formed by joining a body part to a present participle. Used as adjectives or nouns.
nail-biting, arm-twisting, backbreaking, finger licking, lip-smacking, bellyaching, gut-wrenching, head scratching, toe tapping, butt kicking, face saving, eyebrow-raising and 9 more...
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Realism
Words to describe the art during the Realist movement
reality, harsh, criticizing, working-class, labor, working, organized, status, satire, dark, masses, ordinary and 45 more...
Tweets
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