plantation

Everyday

1. A plantation is a large farm, usually in a hot country, where one crop such as cotton, sugar, tea, coffee or rubber is grown. tree →
2. A plantation is also an area where many trees have been planted in rows, for example for wood. tree →
3. (history) In the past, many plantations in the Americas used enslaved African people who were forced to work without pay. tree →

In the lessons

In history lessons, plantations are linked to the slave trade and to the American Civil War; this is taught as a serious wrong. In geography, tea plantations in India or Sri Lanka and palm oil plantations show how farming changes land and forests. In Ireland, «the Plantation of Ulster» was when land was taken and given to settlers from Britain.

Examples

• Tea is grown on huge plantations on green hillsides. tree →
• Enslaved people were forced to pick cotton on plantations. tree →
• The pine plantation had trees in straight rows. tree →
• Cutting forests for palm oil plantations harms orangutans. tree →
• We read a story about a girl who escaped from a plantation. tree →
• Workers on the coffee plantation pick the beans by hand. tree →
• When she was gone, no one attended to her plantations, and the garden ran to waste. tree →

Note

Countable. Stress on «-TAY-». A plantation grows one main crop on a large scale; a «farm» can be any size and grow many things. A word with a painful history: speak about it carefully and truthfully.

In Jewish tradition

A planted place, such as a garden of trees or a settlement among hedges. It does not mean a slave farm here.

Interpretation. Ezekiel uses the picture to describe the great tree of Assyria and God's promise to plant Israel again in safety.

Examples

• These were the potters, and those that dwelt among plantations and hedges; there they dwelt occupied in the king's work. (Writings 1CH.4.23, JPS 1917) tree →
• The waters nourished it, the deep made it to grow; her rivers ran round about her plantation, and she sent out her conduits unto all the trees of the field. (Prophets EZK.31.4, JPS 1917) tree →
• And I will raise up unto them a plantation for renown, and they shall be no more consumed with hunger in the land, neither bear the shame of the nations any more. (Prophets EZK.34.29, JPS 1917) tree →

Note

Countable. Stress on «-TAY-». A plantation grows one main crop on a large scale; a «farm» can be any size and grow many things. A word with a painful history: speak about it carefully and truthfully.