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Jehovah's Witnesses

(Encyclopedia)Jehovah's Witnesses, Christian group originating in the United States at the end of the 19th cent., organized by Charles Taze Russell, whose doctrine centers on the Second Coming of Christ. The Witnes...

drought

(Encyclopedia)drought, abnormally long period of insufficient rainfall. Drought cannot be defined in terms of inches of rainfall or number of days without rain, since it is determined by such variable factors as th...

Haneke, Michael

(Encyclopedia)Haneke, Michael häˈnəkə [key], 1942–, Austrian film director and screenwriter, b. Munich, Germany. In the 1970s and 80s, he wrote and directed for television and the theater. His first film, The...

Buffalo Bill

(Encyclopedia)Buffalo Bill, 1846–1917, American plainsman, scout, and showman, b. near Davenport, Iowa. His real name was William Frederick Cody. His family moved (1854) to Kansas, and after the death of his fath...

McEwan, Ian

(Encyclopedia)McEwan, Ian (Ian Russell McEwan) məkyo͞oˈən [key], 1948–, English novelist, b. Aldershot, B.A. Univ. of Sussex, 1970, M.A. Univ. of East Anglia, 1971. His early short-story collections, First Lo...

realism, in philosophy

(Encyclopedia)realism, in philosophy. 1 In medieval philosophy realism represented a position taken on the problem of universals. There were two schools of realism. Extreme realism, represented by William of Champe...

red giant

(Encyclopedia)red giant, star that is relatively cool but very luminous because of its great size. All normal stars are expected to pass eventually through a red-giant phase as a consequence of stellar evolution. A...

Barnard, Frederick Augustus Porter

(Encyclopedia)Barnard, Frederick Augustus Porter, 1809–89, American educator and mathematician, b. Sheffield, Mass., grad. Yale, 1828. After tutoring at Yale and teaching in institutions for the deaf and mute, he...

Ghent, Treaty of

(Encyclopedia)Ghent, Treaty of, 1814, agreement ending the War of 1812 between the United States and Great Britain. It was signed at Ghent, Belgium, on Dec. 24, 1814, and ratified by the U.S. Senate in Feb., 1815. ...

Irish literary renaissance

(Encyclopedia)Irish literary renaissance, late 19th- and early 20th-century movement that aimed at reviving ancient Irish folklore, legends, and traditions in new literary works. The movement, also called the Celti...