Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Native American languages

(Encyclopedia)Native American languages, languages of the native peoples of the Western Hemisphere and their descendants. A number of the Native American languages that were spoken at the time of the European arriv...

Hettner, Alfred

(Encyclopedia)Hettner, Alfred älˈfrĕt hĕtˈnər [key], 1859–1942, German geographer and teacher; a founder of modern German geography. His methodology and his materialistic philosophy, grounded in the work of...

San Marcos, University of

(Encyclopedia)San Marcos, University of, at Lima, Peru; the first university in South America; founded 1551 by the Spanish king Charles I (Holy Roman Emperor Charles V) and recognized by papal bull in 1571; closed ...

Permian Basin

(Encyclopedia)Permian Basin or West Texas Basin, extensive sedimentary basin, West Texas and SE New Mexico. Covering an area of more than 75,000 sq mi (194,000 sq km), its main components are the Midland Basin on t...

Martin, Agnes

(Encyclopedia)Martin, Agnes (Agnes Bernice Martin), 1912–2004, American painter, b. Macklin, Canada. She moved to the United States in 1931, began painting in 1942,...

Cinco de Mayo

(Encyclopedia)Cinco de Mayo, May 5, the anniversary of Mexico's victory over France in 1862 in the Battle of Puebla, in which Gen. Ignacio Zaragoza's small, ill-equipped Mexican forces defeated a much larger French...

Hufstedler, Shirley Mount

(Encyclopedia)Hufstedler, Shirley Mount, 1925–2016, American jurist and U.S. secretary of education (1980–81), b. Denver, as Shirley Ann Mount, grad. Univ. of New Mexico (B.B.A. 1945) and Stanford Law School (L...

Kluckhohn, Clyde Kay Maben

(Encyclopedia)Kluckhohn, Clyde Kay Maben klŭckˈhōn [key], 1905–60, American anthropologist, b. LeMars, Iowa, grad. Univ. of Wisconsin, 1928, M.A. Oxford, 1932, Ph.D. Harvard, 1936. He taught at the Univ. of Ne...

Richter, Conrad

(Encyclopedia)Richter, Conrad rĭkˈtər [key], 1890–1968, American novelist, b. Pine Grove, Pa. After newspaper work in Pennsylvania and Ohio, he moved to New Mexico. Richter's novels treat the American frontier...

peonage

(Encyclopedia)peonage pēˈənĭj [key], system of involuntary servitude based on the indebtedness of the laborer (the peon) to his creditor. It was prevalent in Spanish America, especially in Mexico, Guatemala, Ec...