hardscrabble

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Picking through the past: Bluegrass master Ralph Stanley recalls his hardscrabble upbringing and a life in music in the memoir, "Man of Constant Sorrow."

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Definitions (3)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. adjective Earning a bare subsistence, as on the land; marginal: the sharecropper's hardscrabble life.
  2. noun Barren or marginal farmland.

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Examples (50)

  • These captives were treated fairly well, as slaves go There were a few other outlanders as well-hardscrabble survivors of caravans that did not pay the demanded tolls for traversing Suwwardi land. —  JEFF GRUBB
  • Her theory: Reporters prefer American royalty to those with hardscrabble, humble beginnings, like Palin. —  Home - BostonHerald.com
  • The national spotlight has not always been kind to Gloucester, from its depiction as a hardscrabble port in the book "The Perfect Storm" to the recent uproar over reports of a teenage pregnancy pact. —  Boston.com Most Popular
  • One can still find wild rats (sometimes in great abundance), but most rats escaped that hardscrabble life at the same time we did. —  SEEDMAGAZINE.COM
  • Many scenes were filmed in hardscrabble locations in and around the show's scruffy Los Angeles studio.
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