Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) personality, in psychology, the patterns of behavior, thought, and emotion unique to an individual, and the ways they interact to help or hinder the adjustment of a person to other people and situatio...

(Encyclopedia) Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), division of the U.S. Dept. of Justice charged with investigating all violations of federal laws except those assigned to some other federal agency. The FBI has j...

(Encyclopedia) wages, payment received by an employee in exchange for labor. It may be in goods or services but is customarily in money. The term in a broad sense refers to what is received in any way for labor, but...

(Encyclopedia) war, armed conflict between states or nations (international war) or between factions within a state (civil war), prosecuted by force and having the purpose of compelling the defeated side to do the w...

(Encyclopedia)  CE5 A. Side view of jet-propelled airplane B. Top view airplane, aeroplane, or aircraft, heavier-than-air vehicle, mechanically driven and fitted with fixed wings that support it in flight thro...

(Encyclopedia) Audubon, John James ôˈdəbŏn [key], 1785–1851, American ornithologist, b. Les Cayes, Santo Domingo (now Haiti). The illegitimate son of a French sea captain and plantation owner and a Creole cham...

(Encyclopedia) Memphis mĕmˈfĭs [key], city (1990 pop. 610,337), seat of Shelby co., SW Tenn., on the Fourth, or Lower, Chickasaw Bluff above the Mississippi, at the mouth of the Wolf River; inc. 1826. A river por...

(Encyclopedia) convention, in U.S. politics, a gathering of delegates to nominate candidates for elective office and to formulate party policy. They are held at the national, state, and local levels. State convent...

(Encyclopedia) Curtis, Edward Sheriff, 1868–1952, American photographer and pioneer ethnographer known for his documentation of Native Americans, b. near Whitewater, Wis. Curtis was obsessed with photography from ...

(Encyclopedia) San Antonio săn ăntōˈnēō, əntōnˈ [key], city (1990 pop. 935,933), seat of Bexar co., S central Tex., at the source of the San Antonio River; inc. 1837. The third largest city in Texas, it is ...