Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters

(Encyclopedia)American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, honorary academy of notable American artists, writers, and composers. The National Institute of Arts and Letters, founded in 1898, served as the par...

Sembene, Ousmane

(Encyclopedia)Sembene, Ousmane o͝osmäˈnĕ səmbĕˈnĕ [key], 1923–2007, Senegalese author and film director who wrote and made films in French and Wolof, often regarded as the father of sub-Saharan African ci...

Baruch, book of the Septuagint and of the Apocrypha

(Encyclopedia)Baruch, early Jewish book included in the Septuagint, but not included in the Hebrew Bible and placed in the Apocrypha in the Authorized Version. It is named for a Jewish prince Baruch (fl. 600 b.c.),...

Wolfe, Thomas Clayton

(Encyclopedia)Wolfe, Thomas Clayton, 1900–1938, American novelist, b. Asheville, N.C., grad. Univ. of North Carolina, 1920, M.A. Harvard, 1922. An important 20th-century American novelist, Wolfe wrote four mammot...

Harrison

(Encyclopedia)Harrison, town (2020 pop. 19,450), Hudson co., NE N.J., a suburb on the Passaic River opposite Newark; inc. 1869. Harrison's industries include chemical...

Linklater, Richard Stuart

(Encyclopedia)Linklater, Richard Stuart, 1960–, American screenwriter, director, and actor, b. Houston. He dropped out of college and worked on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, then moved to Austin (1983), where...

Five-Year Plan

(Encyclopedia)Five-Year Plan, Soviet economic practice of planning to augment agricultural and industrial output by designated quotas for a limited period of usually five years. Nations other than the former USSR a...

unemployment

(Encyclopedia)unemployment, condition of one who is able to work but unable to find work. Once assumed to be voluntary, idleness was punishable by law; however it is now recognized that unemployment often arises fr...

Beach Boys, The

(Encyclopedia)Beach Boys, The, American rock music band formed in 1961 by brothers Brian Wilson, 1942–, Dennis Wilson, 1944–83, and Carl ...

Fenech Adami, Edward

(Encyclopedia)Fenech Adami, Edward, 1934–, Maltese political leader, prime minister (1987–96, 1998–2004) and president (2004–9) of Malta. A lawyer, he joined the Christian Democratic Nationalist party in th...