"at the coal face" meaning in All languages combined

See at the coal face on Wiktionary

Prepositional phrase [English]

Audio: en-au-at the coal face.ogg
Etymology: From being in a coal mine, at the face where the mining is actually occurring, especially in dark, cramped, dirty, hazardous conditions. Compare front line and trenches, of similar formation. Head templates: {{head|en|prepositional phrase|head=}} at the coal face, {{en-prep phrase}} at the coal face
  1. (UK, idiomatic) Directly engaged in the operations of a business, rather than in a hands off, managerial position. Wikipedia link: coal mine Tags: UK, idiomatic Synonyms: in the trenches, where the rubber meets the road Related terms: chalkface, codeface, front line, day-to-day, hands-on, nitty-gritty, nuts and bolts, on the tools, roll up one's sleeves
    Sense id: en-at_the_coal_face-en-prep_phrase-VFzkhcXh Categories (other): British English, English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries
{
  "etymology_text": "From being in a coal mine, at the face where the mining is actually occurring, especially in dark, cramped, dirty, hazardous conditions. Compare front line and trenches, of similar formation.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prepositional phrase",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "at the coal face",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "at the coal face",
      "name": "en-prep phrase"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "prep_phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "British English",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Directly engaged in the operations of a business, rather than in a hands off, managerial position."
      ],
      "id": "en-at_the_coal_face-en-prep_phrase-VFzkhcXh",
      "links": [
        [
          "Directly",
          "directly"
        ],
        [
          "engaged",
          "engaged"
        ],
        [
          "operation",
          "operation"
        ],
        [
          "business",
          "business"
        ],
        [
          "hands off",
          "hands off"
        ],
        [
          "managerial",
          "managerial"
        ],
        [
          "position",
          "position"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(UK, idiomatic) Directly engaged in the operations of a business, rather than in a hands off, managerial position."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "chalkface"
        },
        {
          "word": "codeface"
        },
        {
          "word": "front line"
        },
        {
          "word": "day-to-day"
        },
        {
          "word": "hands-on"
        },
        {
          "word": "nitty-gritty"
        },
        {
          "word": "nuts and bolts"
        },
        {
          "word": "on the tools"
        },
        {
          "word": "roll up one's sleeves"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "in the trenches"
        },
        {
          "word": "where the rubber meets the road"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "UK",
        "idiomatic"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "coal mine"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-at the coal face.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/1/19/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "at the coal face"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "From being in a coal mine, at the face where the mining is actually occurring, especially in dark, cramped, dirty, hazardous conditions. Compare front line and trenches, of similar formation.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prepositional phrase",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "at the coal face",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "at the coal face",
      "name": "en-prep phrase"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "prep_phrase",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "chalkface"
    },
    {
      "word": "codeface"
    },
    {
      "word": "front line"
    },
    {
      "word": "day-to-day"
    },
    {
      "word": "hands-on"
    },
    {
      "word": "nitty-gritty"
    },
    {
      "word": "nuts and bolts"
    },
    {
      "word": "on the tools"
    },
    {
      "word": "roll up one's sleeves"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "British English",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English prepositional phrases",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Directly engaged in the operations of a business, rather than in a hands off, managerial position."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "Directly",
          "directly"
        ],
        [
          "engaged",
          "engaged"
        ],
        [
          "operation",
          "operation"
        ],
        [
          "business",
          "business"
        ],
        [
          "hands off",
          "hands off"
        ],
        [
          "managerial",
          "managerial"
        ],
        [
          "position",
          "position"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(UK, idiomatic) Directly engaged in the operations of a business, rather than in a hands off, managerial position."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "UK",
        "idiomatic"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "coal mine"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-at the coal face.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/1/19/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/En-au-at_the_coal_face.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "in the trenches"
    },
    {
      "word": "where the rubber meets the road"
    }
  ],
  "word": "at the coal face"
}

Download raw JSONL data for at the coal face meaning in All languages combined (1.8kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-21 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-12-04 using wiktextract (d8cb2f3 and 4e554ae). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.