graft

What it means

1. 1.

   Hard work, and the willingness to do it. 'He's a great grafter' is high praise on a building site and in an office alike.

2. 2.

   To work hard, often at something unglamorous: 'I was grafting all weekend'.

In use

• It's hard graft but the money's good.

• She grafted for everything she has.

Where it comes from

From nineteenth-century British slang for work, unrelated to the American 'graft' meaning political corruption — the two words share a spelling and nothing else. In Ireland and the north of England it kept its approving tone.