A member of the lowly social class which toils on the land, constituted by small farmers and tenants, sharecroppers, farmhands and other laborers on the land where they form the main labor force in agriculture and horticulture
A peasant is a poor person of low social status who works on the land; used of people who live in countries where farming is still a common way of life. the peasants in the Peruvian highlands. Any member of a class that tills the soil as small landowners or agricultural labourers. The peasant economy generally has a simple technology and a division of labour by age and sex. The basic unit of production is the family or household. Peasant families traditionally consume what they produce, though a portion of their output may be sold in the market or paid to a landlord. Productivity per worker and yields per unit of land are usually low. Peasants as a class tend to disappear as a society industrializes, though peasantlike social structures may persist under new economic regimens. See also ejido; feudalism; hacienda; serfdom
a country person a crude uncouth ill-bred person lacking culture or refinement one of a (chiefly European) class of agricultural laborers
A member of the class constituted by small farmers and tenants, sharecroppers, and laborers on the land where they form the main labor force in agriculture