slave driver
Americannoun
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an overseer of enslaved laborers and enforcer of hierarchy and discipline in the institution of chattel slavery.
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a hard taskmaster.
His boss was a slave driver.
noun
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(esp formerly) a person forcing slaves to work
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an employer who demands excessively hard work from his employees
Etymology
Origin of slave driver
An Americanism dating back to 1800–10
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The rebels were led by Charles Deslondes, a mixed-race slave who laboured as a slave driver on Andry’s plantation.
From The Guardian • May 6, 2019
Perhaps as many five hundred joined the rebellion, led by Charles Deslondes, a mixed-race slave driver on a sugar plantation owned by Manuel Andry.
From Textbooks • Dec. 30, 2014
But in Chiang Kai-shek's China there was no slave driver with a lash.
From Time Magazine Archive
He considers the adrenals the "power station" of the sympathetic nervous system, the frontal lobe of the brain as the "slave driver."
From Time Magazine Archive
I shall be as grim as grim can be and a regular slave driver as far as lessons are concerned.
From Grace Harlowe's Return to Overton Campus by Flower, Jessie Graham [pseud.]
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
