Mechanization

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˌmɛkənaɪˈzeɪʃən/

Definitions

1. The process of replacing human labor or manual work with machines or automated systems to increase efficiency and productivity
2. The implementation of machines and automated processes replaces manual labor while enhancing operational efficiency and productivity
3. A technique in which machinery and automation supplant human work to boost efficiency and overall output

Etymology: "Mechanization" is simply "mechanize" with the suffix "-ation" added, and the suffix carries most of the history. The "-ation" ending came into English through Old French from the Latin "-ātiō", a noun-forming ending that turns a verb into the name of the act or process it describes. English took it in during the Middle Ages, as "-acioun" and then "-ation," so the suffix was already long established by the time anyone needed to name the process of making things run on machines. The verb underneath is the more recent piece. "Mechanize" is built on "mechanic," which goes back through Latin "mechanicus" to Greek "mēkhanikos," from "mēkhanē," meaning "machine" or "contrivance." Writers in the Greek and Roman world used the same root for devices and for cunning, so a "mechanism" was once as much a clever trick as a piece of hardware. The sense of replacing human hands with machinery arrived much later, in the industrial era, when the verb came to describe equipping work with machines and the noun followed to name that change.

Synonyms: automation, industrialization

Antonyms: manual labor