Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

radio range

(Encyclopedia)radio range, geographically fixed radio transmitter that radiates coded signals in all directions to enable aircraft and ships to determine their bearings. An aircraft or ship can determine its line o...

Ishiguro, Kazuo

(Encyclopedia)Ishiguro, Kazuo, 1954–, English novelist, b. Nagasaki. His family left Japan in 1960 and immigrated to England, where he attended the universities of Kent (B.A., 1978) and East Anglia (M.A., 1980). ...

bounty, payment made by a government

(Encyclopedia)bounty, amount paid by a government for the achievement of certain economic or other goals. It often takes the form of a premium paid for the increased production or export of certain goods. The bount...

Annaka

(Encyclopedia)Annaka än-näˈkä [key], city, Gumma prefecture, central Honshu, Japan. It is an agricultural and tourist center, noted for its mineral springs. ...

Albi

(Encyclopedia)Albi älbēˈ [key], town, capital of Tarn dept., S France, in Languedoc, on the Tarn River. A commercial center, its has glassworks and food-processing, textile-manufactu...

Ellis Island

(Encyclopedia)Ellis Island, island, c.27 acres (10.9 hectares), in Upper New York Bay, SW of Manhattan island. Government-controlled since 1808, it was long the site of an arsenal and a fort, but most famously serv...

Flanagan, Richard

(Encyclopedia)Flanagan, Richard, 1961–, Australian novelist, b. Longford, Tasmania, studied Univ. of Tasmania (grad. 1982), Oxford (Rhodes scholar). Flanagan, whose novels explore the past and present of his nati...

narcissism

(Encyclopedia)narcissism närsĭsˈĭzəm [key], Freudian term, drawn from the Greek myth of Narcissus, indicating an exclusive self-absorption. In psychoanalysis, narcissism is considered a normal stage in the dev...

Leskov, Nikolai Semyonovich

(Encyclopedia)Leskov, Nikolai Semyonovich nyĭkəlīˈ sĭmyôˈnəvĭch lyĭskôfˈ [key], 1831–95, Russian short-story writer and novelist. Leskov was first a civil servant, then an agent for his uncle's busine...

Yangzhou

(Encyclopedia)Yangzhou or Yangchow both: yängˈjōˈ [key], city (1994 est. pop. 355,500), Jiangsu prov., China, on the Grand Canal. It is an agricultural market and transportation center with textile and other li...

Browse by Subject