Done with great effort and difficulty; seeming forced, strained, or not natural or easy.
From the verb 'labour' (Old French 'laborer,' from Latin 'laborare,' to work). The adjective form means bearing the marks of hard, strenuous work or effort.
The spelling 'laboured' with a 'u' is distinctly British and Commonwealth English, while Americans spell it 'labored'—a perfect example of how the same verb evolved different spelling preferences in different English-speaking countries after independence.
Women's unpaid labour (domestic, reproductive, emotional) has been systematically excluded from 'labour' definitions and economic accounting. Gendered asymmetry: men's work is 'labour,' women's is 'duty.'
When discussing work, explicitly include caregiving, domestic, and emotional labour; audit whether you apply 'laboured' equally to all genders.
["work","effort","contribution"]
Feminist economics has documented how women's labour sustains economies while remaining invisible; modern accounting increasingly captures gender-stratified labour contributions.
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