Definitions

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  • noun Plural form of proletarian.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The lobbyists, and bourgeoises are hell bent to see the rest of us remain proletarians forever!!

    Tea Party movement threatened by internal rifts 2009

  • It seemed strange in a country where the proletarians were the masters.

    My Disillusionment in Russia Goldman, Emma, 1869-1940 1923

  • The proletarians are the forces through which the accumulated means of production reproduce themselves and reconstitute themselves into new wealth; but they themselves live only by enrolling themselves under the authority of capital; and from one day to the next they find themselves out of work, impoverished and exiles.

    Essays on the Materialistic Conception of History 1896

  • Once more these communists, while declaring on the strength of facts which carry conviction that the mission of the proletarians is to be the grave diggers of the bourgeoisie, still recognize the latter as the author of a social form which represents extensively and intensively an important stage of progress, and which alone can furnish the field for the new struggles which already give promise of a happy issue for the proletariat.

    Essays on the Materialistic Conception of History 1896

  • In short, if we mean to be philosophical, our main concern will be that our beliefs should be true; we shall care very little whether they happen to be popular or unpopular with the intellectual 'proletarians' of the moment, and if we can get at a truth, we shall not mind having to go back a long way for it.

    Recent Developments in European Thought Various

  • These so-called "proletarians," though hardly directly represented in the Assembly, nevertheless fondly expected the greatest benefits from the work of that body.

    A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. Carlton J. H. Hayes 1923

  • He remembers his brother's death, an early courtship, his days working in a factory after he dropped out of school and was painfully trying to fit in with his fellow "proletarians," who of course thought he was crazy to have passed up an education.

    NYT > Home Page 2010

  • One of the lynchpins of the Pigneto scene, funkily retro Bar Necci Via Fanfulla da Lodi, 68; necci1924.com , was frequented by a slumming director Pier Paolo Pasolini back in the days when it was full of young proletarians hunched over billiards tables.

    Finding Fellini Lee Marshall 2011

  • One gets the point about drama proceeding even from such tedious circumstances, and that Odets's political point is that these bourgeois characters have been reduced by their economic circumstances to the state suffered by all proletarians.

    A Slow 'Rocket' That Struggles to Take Off Paul Levy 2011

  • When he opened his mouth, he said something every businessman hates to hear, “Where are the proletarians of today, and who are they?”

    Dreamseller: The Calling Augusto Cury 2011

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