Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

291 results found

gay-rights movement

(Encyclopedia)gay-rights movement, organized efforts to end the criminalization of homosexuality and protect the civil rights of homosexuals. While there was some organized activity on behalf of the rights of homos...

Hastert, Dennis

(Encyclopedia)Hastert, Dennis (John Dennis “Denny” Hastert) hăsˈtərt [key], 1942–, U.S. congressman, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives (1999–2007), b. Aurora, Ill. He attended Wheaton College ...

gibbon

(Encyclopedia)gibbon, small ape, family Hylobatidae, found in the forests of SE Asia. The gibbons are known as the small, or lesser, apes; they are the most highly adapted of the apes to arboreal life. They are hig...

Duras, Marguerite

(Encyclopedia)Duras, Marguerite märgərētˈ düräsˈ [key], 1914–96, French author, b. Gia Dinh, Indochina (now Vietnam). Usually grouped with the exponents of the nouveau roman [new novel] (see French literat...

Penn, Arthur Hiller

(Encyclopedia)Penn, Arthur Hiller, 1922–2010, American director, brother of Irving Penn, b. Philadelphia; studied Black Mountain College and the Actors' Studio, Los Angeles. Penn, who often dealt with themes of a...

Sappho

(Encyclopedia)Sappho săfˈō [key], fl. early 6th cent. b.c., greatest of the early Greek lyric poets (Plato calls her “the tenth Muse”), b. Mytilene on Lesbos. Facts about her life are scant. She was an arist...

Rasputin, Grigori Yefimovich

(Encyclopedia)Rasputin, Grigori Yefimovich răspyo͞oˈtĭn, Rus. grĭgôˈrē yĭfēˈməvĭch rəspo͞oˈtyĭn [key], 1869–1916, Russian holy man and courtier, a notorious figure at the court of Czar Nicholas I...

Bloomsbury group

(Encyclopedia)Bloomsbury group, name given to the literary group that made the Bloomsbury area of London the center of its activities from 1904 to World War II. It included Lytton Strachey, Virginia Woolf, Leonard ...

water mold

(Encyclopedia)water mold, common name for a group of multinucleated organisms that superficially resemble fungi but are now recognized as having an independent evolutionary lineage and are placed in the kingdom Pro...

Leopold and Loeb

(Encyclopedia)Leopold and Loeb lōb [key], notorious American murderers defended by Clarence Darrow in 1924. The gregarious, dominating Richard A. Loeb (1905–1936) and the shy, submissive Nathan F. Leopold, Jr. (...