Gangman

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A person in charge of directing and organizing a group of laborers working together on a job or project
2. A supervisor who oversees and manages a team of workers employed to perform collective labor
3. A leader responsible for coordinating the activities and work of a group of employees or laborers

Etymology: "Gangman" is a plain compound, formed from "gang" (a group of people working together, from Old English "gang," meaning a going or a passage) and "-man," a suffix that marks a person who performs a particular kind of work. Put together, the word names a member of a work crew, most often one doing manual labour on a railway line or in a similar outdoor job. The base "gang" has a more literal origin than its modern sense suggests. In Old English it meant a journey or a way, related to the verb "gan" (to go), so a gang was originally something that goes along a route. Over centuries it came to mean a group moving together, and then a group assigned to a shared task, which is how a "gangman" came to be the worker who belongs to such a team.

Synonyms: foreman, supervisor