Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), type of international monetary reserve currency established (1968) by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Created in response to worries concerning the limitations of...

(Encyclopedia) Third World, the technologically less advanced, or developing, nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America, generally characterized as poor, having economies distorted by their dependence on the export...

(Encyclopedia) herbal medicine, use of natural plant substances (botanicals) to treat and prevent illness. The practice has existed since prehistoric times and flourishes today as the primary form of medicine for pe...

(Encyclopedia)  CE5 Mirror arrangements for a reflecting telescope telescope, traditionally, a system of lenses, mirrors, or both, used to gather light from a distant object and form an image of it. Traditional o...

(Encyclopedia) mangrove, large tropical evergreen tree, genus Rhizophora, that grows on muddy tidal flats and along protected ocean shorelines. Mangroves are most abundant in tropical Asia, Africa, and the islands o...

(Encyclopedia) Irish language, also called Irish Gaelic and Erse, member of the Goidelic group of the Celtic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages (see Celtic languages). The history of Irish as a liter...

(Encyclopedia) Oliveros, Pauline, 1932–2016, American composer and musician, b. Houston, Tex., studied Univ. of Houston, San Francisco State College (B.A., 1957). She began playing the accordion as a child, and it...

(Encyclopedia) Palin, Sarah Heath pāˈlĭn [key], 1964–, U.S. politician, b. Sandpoint, Idaho, as Sarah Louise Heath, grad. Univ. of Idaho (B.S. 1987). Her family moved to Alaska not long after she was born. In 1...

(Encyclopedia) Mondrian, Piet pēt mônˈdrēän [key], 1872–1944, Dutch painter. He studied at the academy in Amsterdam and passed through an early naturalistic phase. In 1910 he went to Paris, where the influenc...

(Encyclopedia) Humphrey, Hubert Horatio, 1911–78, U.S. Vice President (1965–69), b. Wallace, S.Dak. After practicing pharmacy for several years, Humphrey taught political science and became involved in state pol...