Columbia Encyclopedia

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capitalism

(Encyclopedia)capitalism, economic system based on private ownership of the means of production, in which personal profit can be acquired through investment of capital and employment of labor. Capitalism is grounde...

Australian aborigines

(Encyclopedia)Australian aborigines, indigenous peoples of Australia. The first modern humans in Australia probably came from somewhere in Asia more than 40,000 years ago, most likely sometime between 55,000 and 10...

soul

(Encyclopedia)soul, the vital, immaterial, life principle, generally conceived as existing within humans and sometimes within all living things, inanimate objects, and the universe as a whole. Religion and philosop...

Edinburgh

(Encyclopedia)Edinburgh ĕdˈĭnbərə [key], city (2021 pop. 542,599) and council area, royal burgh, capital of ...

laissez-faire

(Encyclopedia)laissez-faire lĕsˌā fârˈ [key] [Fr.,=leave alone], in economics and politics, doctrine that an economic system functions best when there is no interference by government. It is based on the belie...

Marshall Islands

(Encyclopedia)Marshall Islands, officially Republic of the Marshall Islands, independent nation (2015 est. pop. 53,000), in the central Pacific. The Marshalls extend over a 700-mi (1,130-km) area and comprise two m...

Eyck, van

(Encyclopedia)Eyck, van văn īk [key], family of Flemish painters, the brothers Hubert van Eyck, c.1370–1426, and Jan van Eyck, c.1390–1441. Of the van Eycks' works that have survived, the largest is an alta...

song

(Encyclopedia)song, relatively brief, simple vocal composition, usually a setting of a poetic text, often strophic, for accompanied solo voice. The song literature of Western music embodies two broad classification...

English art and architecture

(Encyclopedia)English art and architecture, the distinctive national art and architecture that art may be said to have evolved in the 12th cent. with the Norman style. Building before that time was in what is commo...

Australian literature

(Encyclopedia)Australian literature, the literature of Australia. Because the vast majority of early Australian settlers were transported prisoners, the beginnings of Australian literature were oral rather than wri...