LABOUR

labor, labour, toil

(noun) productive work (especially physical work done for wages); “his labor did not require a great deal of skill”

labor, labour, working class, proletariat

(noun) a social class comprising those who do manual labor or work for wages; “there is a shortage of skilled labor in this field”

parturiency, labor, labour, confinement, lying-in, travail, childbed

(noun) concluding state of pregnancy; from the onset of contractions to the birth of a child; “she was in labor for six hours”

labor, labour

(verb) undergo the efforts of childbirth

tug, labor, labour, push, drive

(verb) strive and make an effort to reach a goal; “She tugged for years to make a decent living”; “We have to push a little to make the deadline!”; “She is driving away at her doctoral thesis”

labor, labour, toil, fag, travail, grind, drudge, dig, moil

(verb) work hard; “She was digging away at her math homework”; “Lexicographers drudge all day long”

Source: WordNet® 3.1

Proper noun

Labour

(UK) Short for the Labour Party (UK political party)

(Canada, UK) Misspelling of Labor. (Australian political party)

Etymology

Noun

labour (countable and uncountable, plural labours) (British spelling, Canadian spelling, Australian spelling, New Zealand spelling)

Effort expended on a particular task; toil, work.

That which requires hard work for its accomplishment; that which demands effort.

(uncountable) Workers in general; the working class, the workforce; sometimes specifically the labour movement, organised labour.

(uncountable) A political party or force aiming or claiming to represent the interests of labour.

The act of a mother giving birth.

The time period during which a mother gives birth.

(nautical) The pitching or tossing of a vessel which results in the straining of timbers and rigging.

An old measure of land area in Mexico and Texas, approximately 177 acres.

Usage notes

Like many others ending in -our/-or, this word is spelled labour in the UK and labor in the U.S.; in Canada, labour is preferred, but labor is not unknown. In Australia, labour is the standard spelling, but the Australian Labour Party, founded 1908, "modernised" its spelling to Australian Labor Party in 1912, at the suggestion of American-born King O'Malley, who was a prominent leader in the ALP.

• Adjectives often used with "labour": physical, mental, skilled, technical, organised.

Synonyms

• swink, toil, work

Verb

labour (third-person singular simple present labours, present participle labouring, simple past and past participle laboured) (British spelling, Canadian spelling, Australian spelling, New Zealand spelling)

(intransitive) To toil, to work.

(transitive) To belabour, to emphasise or expand upon (a point in a debate, etc).

To be oppressed with difficulties or disease; to do one's work under conditions which make it especially hard or wearisome; to move slowly, as against opposition, or under a burden.

To suffer the pangs of childbirth.

(nautical) To pitch or roll heavily, as a ship in a turbulent sea.

Source: Wiktionary