indentured

Thân thiện

An indentured servant works in a colonial-era kitchen.

Definition

Adjective: - Bound by a formal contract or agreement: Describes a person who is legally obligated to work for another for a specific period, typically to repay a debt or learn a trade. This often implies a historical context of servitude.

Usage and Examples

• Adjective:
  • He arrived in the colony as an indentured servant. (He arrived under a contract that bound him to work for a master for a set number of years.)
  • The system relied on indentured labor to build the infrastructure. (The system used workers who were legally contracted for a term of service.)

Advanced Usage

• "to be indentured to someone": to be formally contracted to serve a specific person or employer.
  • Young apprentices were often indentured to master craftsmen for seven years.
• Used as a past participle verb form in passive constructions.
  • She was indentured at the age of fourteen to work as a housemaid.

Variants and Related Words

• Indenture (noun): The formal contract or agreement itself that binds a person.
  • He signed an indenture to work on the plantation for five years.
• Indenture (verb): To bind someone by such a contract.
  • The company would indenture young workers from overseas.

Synonyms

• Contracted: Bound by a mutual agreement.
• Bound: Obligated, often by a legal or moral tie.
• Apprenticed: Bound to a master to learn a trade (a specific type of indenture).

Antonyms

• Free: Not under the control or in the service of another.
• Emancipated: Freed from legal, social, or political restrictions.

Related Phrases

• Indentured servitude: The state or period of being an indentured servant.
  • Indentured servitude was a common way for Europeans to immigrate to the American colonies in the 17th century.

Học thuật

Adjective

1. bound by contract

Từ đồng nghĩa

• apprenticed
• articled
• bound