• fifth position (ballet)

    assemblé: …with the feet usually in fifth position demi-plié (feet crossed, knees bent). There are many variations of an assemblé, which can involve turning or traveling across the floor and executing small, battu (“beaten”) steps.

  • Fifth Republic (South Korean history)

    South Korea: The Fifth Republic: In August 1980 Chun Doo-Hwan was elected president by the NCU. A new constitution, under which the president was limited to one seven-year term, was approved in October, ushering in the Fifth Republic. Martial law was lifted in January 1981, and in February…

  • Fifth Republic (French history)

    Fifth Republic, system of government in France from 1958. Under the constitution crafted by Charles de Gaulle with the help of Michel Debré, executive power was increased at the expense of the National Assembly. In 1959 de Gaulle was inaugurated as the first president of the Fifth Republic, with

  • Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy, The (work by Lewis)

    Michael Lewis: Human behavior, the pandemic, and beyond: …basis of Lewis’s 2018 book, The Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy.

  • Fifth Seal, The (novel by Aldanov)

    Mark Aldanov: …anti-Soviet satire, Nachalo kontsa (1939; The Fifth Seal); and Istoki (1947; Before the Deluge), a picture of Europe in the 1870s.

  • Fifth Season, The (novel by Jemisin)

    12 Contemporary Black Authors You Must Read: N.K. Jemisin: …earned her first Hugo for The Fifth Season, the inaugural book of her apocalyptic Broken Earth Trilogy. Set in the distant future, the series describes periods of geologic and climatic catastrophe (the so-called “fifth seasons”) suffered by Earth. Each book in the series won a Hugo Award in the novel…

  • Fifth Sunday (short stories by Dove)

    Rita Dove: …volume of short stories titled Fifth Sunday (1985), Dove focused her attention on the particulars of family life and personal struggle, addressing the larger social and political dimensions of the Black experience primarily by indirection. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Thomas and Beulah (1986) is a cycle of poems chronicling the lives…

  • Fifth Symphony (symphony by Beethoven)

    Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, Op. 67, orchestral work by German composer Ludwig van Beethoven, widely recognized by the ominous four-note opening motif—often interpreted as the musical manifestation of “fate knocking at the door”—that recurs in various guises throughout the composition. The symphony

  • fifth wheel (mechanics)

    truck: Types and definitions: A device called a fifth wheel is used to connect a truck tractor to a semitrailer and to permit articulation between the units. It generally includes a lower half, consisting of a trunnion (pivot assembly) plate and latching mechanism, mounted on the truck tractor for connection with a kingpin…

  • fifth-generation data network (data network)

    5G, fifth-generation telecommunications technology. Introduced in 2019 and now globally deployed, 5G delivers faster connectivity with higher bandwidth and “lower latency” (shorter delay times), improving the performance of phone calls, streaming, videoconferencing, gaming, and business

  • fifth-generation language (computing)

    artificial intelligence programming language: Known as fifth-generation languages, these are in use on nonnumerical parallel computers developed at the Institute.

  • fifths, circle of (music theory)

    circle of fifths, in music theory, visual representation of the organization of the 12 major and 12 minor musical keys and the relationships between them. The circle of fifths is so named because of its circular shape and because each key is a perfect fifth from the next. The circle includes two

  • Fifty Comedies and Tragedies Written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher (work by Fletcher and Beaumont)

    John Fletcher: …52 plays in the folio Fifty Comedies and Tragedies… (1679); but any consideration of the canon must omit one play from the 1679 folio (James Shirley’s Coronation) and add three not to be found in it (Henry VIII, Sir John van Olden Barnavelt, A Very Woman). Of these 54 plays…

  • Fifty Shades Darker (film by Foley [2017])

    Kim Basinger: …Guys (2016), she appeared in Fifty Shades Darker (2017) and Fifty Shades Freed (2018), both of which were based on E.L. James’s series of erotic novels.

  • Fifty Shades Darker (novel by James)

    E.L. James: …offline, and her second book, Fifty Shades Darker, was released in September 2011. The third book in the series, Fifty Shades Freed, was published in January 2012, and in February James signed a contract with the major international publisher Knopf Doubleday. While these initial installments were from Ana’s perspective, James…

  • Fifty Shades Freed (novel by James)

    E.L. James: …third book in the series, Fifty Shades Freed, was published in January 2012, and in February James signed a contract with the major international publisher Knopf Doubleday. While these initial installments were from Ana’s perspective, James later issued a series of books as told by Christian: Grey (2015), Darker (2017),…

  • Fifty Shades Freed (film by Foley [2018])

    Kim Basinger: …Fifty Shades Darker (2017) and Fifty Shades Freed (2018), both of which were based on E.L. James’s series of erotic novels.

  • Fifty Shades of Grey (film by Taylor-Johnson [2015])

    E.L. James: …novel was adapted as a 2015 film starring Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson as Grey and Steele, respectively. Though subject to the same critical flogging as James’s novels, the movie was highly profitable. Two sequels followed, Fifty Shades Darker in 2017 and Fifty Shades Freed in 2018.

  • Fifty Shades of Grey (novel by James)

    E.L. James: …author best known for the Fifty Shades series of erotic novels.

  • Fifty Works of English and American Literature We Could Do Without (work by Brophy, Levey and Osborne)

    Brigid Brophy: …Osborne, Brophy wrote the controversial Fifty Works of English and American Literature We Could Do Without (1967), which attacked many eminent literary figures and criticized such works as Hamlet and Huckleberry Finn. Her other nonfiction includes critical portraits—such as Mozart the Dramatist (1964) and Black and White: A Portrait of…

  • Fifty-four Forty or Fight (United States history)

    James K. Polk: Early life and career: …54°40′ with the campaign slogan “Fifty-four forty or fight.” His election was close, but it was decisive—a popular plurality of about 38,000 votes and 170 electoral votes against 105 for Clay.

  • Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment (United States military)

    54th Regiment, Massachusetts infantry unit made up of African Americans that was active during the American Civil War (1861–65). The 54th Regiment became famous for its fighting prowess and for the great courage of its members. Its exploits were depicted in the 1989 film Glory. The abolitionist

  • fifty-move rule (chess)

    chess: Object of the game: …moved within a period of 50 moves.

  • Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido (work by Hiroshige)

    Hiroshige: His print series Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō (1833–34) is perhaps his finest achievement.

  • FIG (sports organization)

    gymnastics: International organization and competition: In 1881 the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique (FIG) was founded to supervise international competition. The 1896 Olympic Games fostered interest in gymnastics, and the FIG World Championships in gymnastics were organized for men in 1903 and for women in 1934.

  • fig (plant and fruit)

    fig, (Ficus carica), plant of the mulberry family (Moraceae) and its edible fruit. The common fig is indigenous to an area extending from Asiatic Turkey to northern India, but natural seedlings grow in most Mediterranean countries; it is cultivated in warm climates. In the Mediterranean region the

  • fig (plant genus)

    Ficus, (genus Ficus), genus of about 900 species of trees, shrubs, and vines in the family Moraceae, many of which are commonly known as figs. Native primarily to tropical areas of East Asia, they are distributed throughout the world’s tropics. Many are tall forest trees that are buttressed by

  • Fig for Momus, A (work by Lodge)

    Thomas Lodge: In A Fig for Momus (1595), he introduced classical satires and verse epistles (modeled after those of Juvenal and Horace) into English literature for the first time. Aside from Rosalynde: Euphues Golden Legacie (1590), which provided the plot for Shakespeare’s comedy, Lodge’s most important romance was…

  • fig insect (insect)

    fig wasp, (family Agaonidae), any of about 900 species of tiny, solitary wasps responsible for pollinating the world’s 900 species of figs (see Ficus). Each species of fig wasp pollinates only one species of fig, and each fig species has its own wasp species to pollinate it. This extraordinary

  • fig shell (gastropod family)

    gastropod: Classification: … (Bursidae), triton shells (Cymatiidae), and fig shells (Ficidae); frog and triton shells often live in rocky areas; most species large in size. Suborder Neogastropoda (Stenoglossa) Carnivorous or scavengers with rachiglossate (with 3 denticles) or taxoglossate (with 2 denticles) radula; shell often with long siphonal canal; proboscis well developed and often…

  • fig tree (plant genus)

    Ficus, (genus Ficus), genus of about 900 species of trees, shrubs, and vines in the family Moraceae, many of which are commonly known as figs. Native primarily to tropical areas of East Asia, they are distributed throughout the world’s tropics. Many are tall forest trees that are buttressed by

  • Fig Tree microfossils (paleontology)

    Fig Tree microfossils, assemblage of microscopic structures uncovered in the Fig Tree Series, a rock layer at least three billion years old, exposed in South Africa. They apparently represent several organisms—among the oldest known—including a rod-shaped bacterium named Eobacterium isolatum and a

  • Fig Tree Series (geology)

    black shale: 2-billion-year-old Fig Tree Series of South Africa. The Green River formation, an oil-shale formation in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming, is a potentially valuable source of synthetic crude oil. In eastern Germany and Poland the Kupferschiefer, a bituminous shale, is mined for copper, lead, and zinc.

  • fig wasp (insect)

    fig wasp, (family Agaonidae), any of about 900 species of tiny, solitary wasps responsible for pollinating the world’s 900 species of figs (see Ficus). Each species of fig wasp pollinates only one species of fig, and each fig species has its own wasp species to pollinate it. This extraordinary

  • fig-marigold family (plant family)

    Caryophyllales: Economic importance: Aizoaceae includes ice plants, sea figs (also called beach apples), and living stones (lithops). Stem or leaf succulents in Cactaceae and Aizoaceae are commonly collected and used in rock gardens.

  • Figari, Pedro (Uruguayan artist)

    Uruguay: The arts: The Post-Impressionist painter Pedro Figari achieved international renown for his pastel studies of subjects in Montevideo and the countryside. Blending elements of art and nature, the work of the landscape architect Leandro Silva Delgado has also earned international prominence.

  • Fígaro (Spanish writer)

    Mariano José de Larra was a Spanish journalist and satirist who attacked contemporary society for its social habits, literary tastes, and political ineptitude. Larra’s family was forced to move to France in 1814 owing to public resentment against his father for having collaborated with the French

  • Figaro (French literary character)

    Figaro, comic character, a barber turned valet, who is best known as the hero of Le Barbier de Séville (1775; The Barber of Seville) and Le Mariage de Figaro (1784; The Marriage of Figaro), two popular comedies of intrigue by the French dramatist Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais. They are now

  • Figaro, Le (French newspaper)

    Le Figaro, morning daily newspaper published in Paris, one of the great newspapers of France and of the world. Founded in 1826 as a sardonic and witty gossip sheet on the arts—named for Figaro, the barber of Seville—by 1866 Le Figaro was a daily that engaged some of the finest writers in France and

  • Figes, Eva (British author, critic, and translator)

    Eva Figes was an English novelist, social critic, and translator who reacted against traditional realist literature by inventing new forms for her own works. Figes received a B.A. with honours from Queen Mary College in London in 1953 and subsequently worked for various publishing companies until

  • Figg, Eugene C., Jr. (engineer)

    Sunshine Skyway Bridge: Designed by Eugene C. Figg, Jr., and Jean Muller, the Sunshine Skyway Bridge was the longest cable-stayed concrete bridge in the world when it opened in 1987. Given that Tampa Bay houses Port St. Pete, Port Tampa Bay, and SeaPort Manatee, the bridge spans one of the…

  • Figg, James (English boxer)

    James Figg was a British bare-knuckle boxer who was the sport’s first recognized champion of England. Also an expert at wrestling, swordplay, and fighting with cudgels, he became prominent as a pugilist about 1719. (Read Gene Tunney’s 1929 Britannica essay on boxing.) Standing 6 feet tall and

  • Figgis, Mike (British director and screenwriter)

    Kim Novak: …a disagreement with the writer-director Mike Figgis during the filming of Liebestraum (1991).

  • Fight Between a Cock and a Turkey, The (painting by Hondecoeter)

    Melchior de Hondecoeter: …and in flight, such as The Fight Between a Cock and a Turkey. Few of his pictures are dated, though some are signed. Among those with dates are Jackdaw Deprived of His Borrowed Plumage (1671), Game and Poultry (1672), and A Park with Poultry (1686). Hondecoeter’s earliest works are more…

  • Fight Between Carnival and Lent (painting by Bruegel)

    Western painting: Low Countries: …proverbs, children’s games, or “The Fight Between Carnival and Lent” (1559; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) reveal an interest in popular themes and common life rather than in the pedantic Romanizing compositions of some of his contemporaries. This choice of subject matter, latent from the early 15th century in the Low…

  • Fight Club (novel by Palahniuk)

    Chuck Palahniuk: Fight Club: In 1995 Palahniuk published a short story titled “Fight Club” in the anthology Pursuit of Happiness. He decided to expand the story into a novel by the same name. The resulting manuscript was purchased by the publisher W.W. Norton, and the book came…

  • Fight Club (film by Fincher [1999])

    Fight Club, American drama film, released in 1999, that was directed by David Fincher and adapted from Chuck Palahniuk’s 1996 novel of the same name. The film tells the story of an alienated office worker and a charismatic nihilist who start an underground club at which disaffected young men

  • Fight for Life, The (film by Lorentz)

    Pare Lorentz: Lorentz directed The Fight for Life (1940), the compelling and starkly realistic story of the struggle of a young doctor against disease and death during pregnancy and childbirth in a city slum.

  • Fight for You (song by H.E.R.)

    H.E.R.: Music: debuted “I Can’t Breathe,” a protest song that responded to high-profile cases of police brutality against African Americans. The following year the track won the Grammy for song of the year. In addition, “Better Than I Imagined” was named best R&B song. Those awards helped make…

  • Fight Songs (album by Bragg)

    Billy Bragg: In 2011 he released Fight Songs, a compilation of political songs that he had posted to his Web site as free downloads over roughly the previous 10 years. Tooth & Nail, which followed in 2013, mixed mostly personal compositions with a smattering of politically infused works, all set against…

  • fight-or-flight response (physiology)

    fight-or-flight response, response to an acute threat to survival that is marked by physical changes, including nervous and endocrine changes, that prepare a human or an animal to react or to retreat. The functions of this response were first described in the early 1900s by American neurologist and

  • fighter aircraft

    fighter aircraft, aircraft designed primarily to secure control of essential airspace by destroying enemy aircraft in combat. The opposition may consist of fighters of equal capability or of bombers carrying protective armament. For such purposes fighters must be capable of the highest possible

  • fighter kite (aircraft)

    kite: Asia: One ancient design, the fighter kite, became popular throughout Asia. Most variations, including the of India and Japan, are small, flat, roughly diamond-shaped kites made of paper, with a tapered bamboo spine and a balanced bow. Flown without tails that would hinder their agility, these highly maneuverable flat kites…

  • fighter sweep (aerial formation)

    air warfare: Strategic bombing: More effective were fighter sweeps, in which Bf-109s would leave the bombers and attack distant airfields before the defending fighters could get off the ground. But the Luftwaffe, in one of the major miscalculations of the aerial war, usually confined its fast, deadly fighters to close escort of…

  • Fighter, The (film by Russell [2010])

    boxing: Boxing in art, literature, and film: Russell’s The Fighter (2010), which follows two boxing half brothers as one tries to land his big break with training from the other, who is dealing with his own crack cocaine addiction. In books or in film, the climactic match often means salvation or redemption—a time-tested…

  • Fighters for the Freedom of Israel (Zionist extremist organization)

    Stern Gang, Zionist extremist organization in Palestine, founded in 1940 by Avraham Stern (1907–42) after a split in the right-wing underground movement Irgun Zvai Leumi. Extremely anti-British, the group repeatedly attacked British personnel in Palestine and even invited aid from the Axis powers.

  • Fighters for the People (Iranian revolutionary force)

    Iran: The Iran-Iraq War (1980–88): …also provided support to the Mojāhedīn-e Khalq, now headquartered in Iraq. The Mojāhedīn launched a campaign of sporadic and highly demoralizing bombings throughout Iran that killed many clerics and government leaders. In June 1981 a dissident Islamist faction (apparently unrelated to the Mojāhedīn) bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republican…

  • fighting (behavior)

    aggressive behaviour: …many different kinds of animals fight, aggression takes a variety of forms. Sea anemones lash at one another with tentacles armed with stinging cells, rag worms batter each other with the proboscises that they use for digging burrows, lobsters use their large claws for hitting and grasping, tree frogs wrestle,…

  • fighting (sport)

    boxing, sport, both amateur and professional, involving attack and defense with the fists. Boxers usually wear padded gloves and generally observe the code set forth in the marquess of Queensberry rules. Matched in weight and ability, boxing contestants try to land blows hard and often with their

  • Fighting Falcon (aircraft)

    F-16, single-seat, single-engine jet fighter built by the General Dynamics Corporation (now part of the Lockheed Martin Corporation) for the United States and more than a dozen other countries. The F-16 originated in an order placed in 1972 for a lightweight cost-effective air-to-air fighter.

  • Fighting France: From Dunkerque to Belfort (work by Wharton)

    Edith Wharton: …War I was collected as Fighting France: From Dunkerque to Belfort (1918). In her manual The Writing of Fiction (1925) she acknowledged her debt to Henry James. Among her later novels are Twilight Sleep (1927), Hudson River Bracketed (1929), and its sequel, The Gods Arrive (1932). Her autobiography, A Backward

  • fighting game, electronic (electronic game genre)

    electronic fighting game, electronic game genre based on competitive matches between a player’s character and a character controlled by another player or the game. Such matches may strive for realism or include fantasy elements. The genre originated in Japanese video arcades and continues primarily

  • Fighting Harada (Japanese boxer)

    Fighting Harada is a Japanese professional boxer, world flyweight and bantamweight champion. (Read Gene Tunney’s 1929 Britannica essay on boxing.) Harada is considered by many to be Japan’s greatest boxer. He started fighting professionally in 1960 and won his first 25 matches. Harada suffered his

  • Fighting in Hockey (ProCon debate)

    “I went to a fight the other night, and a hockey game broke out,” the late comedian Rodney Dangerfield joked. Fighting has been part of hockey practically since its inception and part of NHL hockey since the league’s formation in 1917. The league instituted Rule 56: Fisticuffs in 1922, which

  • Fighting Instructions (British naval code)

    naval warfare: The age of fighting sail: These Fighting Instructions, though soundly conceived when first issued in 1653, were unsuited to this new opponent, for the implementing system of signals was unimaginative and constraining. Indeed, the two most admired tactical writers of the day, Paul Hoste and Sébastien François Bigot de Morogues, were…

  • Fighting Mac (British soldier)

    Sir Hector Macdonald was a British soldier who won the rare distinction of rising from the ranks to major general. The son of a crofter-mason, he enlisted as a private in the Gordon Highlanders at the age of 18. In 1879 Macdonald took part in the Second Afghan War, where he gained a reputation for

  • Fighting Marine, The (American boxer)

    Gene Tunney was an American boxer who defeated Jack Dempsey in 1926 to become the world heavyweight boxing champion. (Read Gene Tunney’s 1929 Britannica essay on boxing.) Tunney began boxing while working as a clerk for the Ocean Steamship Company in New York City (1915–17). He joined the U.S.

  • fighting power (military)

    logistics: Power versus movement: …force derives from three attributes: fighting power, mobility, and range of movement. Which of these attributes is stressed depends on the commander’s objectives and strategy, but all must compete for available logistic support. Three methods have been used, in combination, in providing this support for forces in the field: self-containment,…

  • fighting ship

    warship, the chief instrument by which military power is projected onto the seas. Warships protect the movement over water of military forces to coastal areas where they may be landed and used against enemy forces; warships protect merchant shipping against enemy attack; they prevent the enemy from

  • Fighting Solidarity (Polish organization)

    Mateusz Morawiecki: Early life and career: …Solidarity, and the founder of Fighting Solidarity, a radical offshoot of Solidarity that refused to compromise with Poland’s communist government. In 1990 he sought the Polish presidency but failed to obtain the 100,000 signatures necessary to get him on the ballot. In 2010 he was on the ballot but did…

  • Fighting Temptations, The (film by Lynn [2003])

    Beyoncé: Acting career and soundtracks: …and led to parts in The Fighting Temptations (2003) and The Pink Panther (2006). In 2006 she played Deena Jones in Dreamgirls, the film adaptation of the 1981 Broadway musical about a 1960s singing group. Beyoncé’s performance was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and her song “Listen” for an…

  • Fighting the Flying Circus (work by Rickenbacker)

    Edward Vernon Rickenbacker: …are published in his book Fighting the Flying Circus (1919).

  • figlia di Iorio, La (play by D’Annunzio)

    Gabriele D’Annunzio: …figlia di Iorio (performed 1904; The Daughter of Jorio), a powerful poetic drama of the fears and superstitions of Abruzzi peasants.

  • figlio di due madri, Il (work by Bontempelli)

    Italian literature: The return to order: writings of Massimo Bontempelli (Il figlio di due madri [1929; “The Son of Two Mothers”]) and of Dino Buzzati (Il deserto dei Tartari [1940; The Tartar Steppe]) were perhaps in part an escape from the prevailing political climate, but they stand up artistically nonetheless. Riccardo Bacchelli, with Il diavolo…

  • Figner, Vera Nikolayevna (Russian revolutionary)

    Vera Nikolayevna Figner was a leader in the Russian Revolutionary Populist (Narodnik) movement. Abandoning her marriage and medical studies for a life devoted to the revolutionary movement, Figner worked in rural areas of Russia, attempting to educate the peasants and to undermine their faith in

  • Fignon, Laurent (French cyclist)

    Laurent Fignon was a French cyclist who was a two-time winner of the Tour de France (1983 and 1984). Fignon began competing in cycling events as a teenager, and in 1982 he turned professional. The following year he raced in his first Tour de France and won the event. Fignon repeated as champion in

  • Figueira (Brazil)

    Governador Valadares, city, eastern Minas Gerais estado (state), Brazil. It lies on the left bank of the Doce River. The city was made the seat of a municipality in 1937. It is an agricultural trade centre dealing in beans, rice, sugarcane, coffee, and livestock. Sawmills and food-processing plants

  • Figueira da Foz (Portugal)

    Figueira da Foz, seaport and concelho (municipality), west-central Portugal. It lies at the mouth of the Mondego River on the Atlantic Ocean, west of Coimbra city. Little is known of its origin, save that it received the title and privileges of a city in 1882. Tourism is a primary economic concern,

  • Figueiredo, João Baptista de Oliveira (president of Brazil)

    João Baptista de Oliveira Figueiredo was a four-star general and president of Brazil from 1979 to 1985. One of the planners of the 1964 coup that established 21 years of military rule, Figueiredo was the last in the succession of five officers chosen by the armed forces to govern Brazil as

  • Figuera, Ángela (Spanish poetry)

    Spanish literature: Poetry: …Machado’s Campos de Castilla; and Ángela Figuera, a teacher, writer of children’s stories, feminist, and social activist, best known for poetry celebrating women and motherhood and denouncing the abuse of women and children. “Social” poets shared utilitarian views of their art: poetry became a tool for changing society, the poet…

  • Figueres Ferrer, José (president of Costa Rica)

    José Figueres Ferrer was a moderate socialist Costa Rican statesman who served as president of a governing junta in 1948–49 and as constitutional president in 1953–58 and 1970–74. Figueres was educated in universities in Costa Rica and Mexico, and he also studied at the Massachusetts Institute of

  • Figueres Olsen, José María (president of Costa Rica)

    Costa Rica: Costa Rica from 1974 to 2000: In 1994 PLN candidate José María Figueres Olsen (the son of three-time president José Figueres Ferrer) won the presidency, defeating the PUSC’s Miguel Angel Rodríguez Echeverría, though the PLN failed to win an outright majority in the Legislative Assembly. Figueres’s policy prescriptions for Costa Rica’s ailing economy—spending cuts and…

  • Figueroa Alcorta, José (president of Argentina)

    Argentina: The rise of radicalism: …way to the presidency for José Figueroa Alcorta, a Cordoban who turned immediately to the task of destroying Roca’s political machine. In 1910 Alcorta installed as his successor Roque Sáenz Peña, a brilliant politician who was fully prepared to construct a governing coalition on new foundations.

  • Figueroa, José Manuel (Mexican singer and songwriter)

    Joan Sebastian was a Mexican singer and songwriter who wrote, performed, and recorded songs in regional Mexican styles and thus won an immense and devoted following and numerous Grammy and Latin Grammy awards. His songs addressed themes of love and loss, and he sang them with genuine feeling and a

  • Figuig (Morocco)

    Figuig, town, northeastern Morocco, located at the juncture of the High Plateaus (Hauts Plateaux) and the northwestern edge of the Sahara. It is an oasis town, surrounded on three sides by the Algerian border. Figuig consists of seven ksars (walled villages) and lies in a basin of the Wadi Zousfana

  • Figulus, Daniel Ernst (German theologian)

    Daniel Ernst Jablonski was a Protestant theologian who worked for a unification of Lutherans and Calvinists. Jablonski studied at Frankfurt an der Oder and at the University of Oxford and began preaching at Magdeburg in 1683. From 1686 to 1691 he headed the Moravian College at Leszno, becoming

  • Figulus, Publius Nigidius (Roman author)

    Publius Nigidius Figulus was a Roman savant and writer, next to Marcus Terentius Varro the most learned Roman of his age, according to the Latin writer Aulus Gellius (2nd century ad). Figulus was a friend of Cicero, to whom he gave his support at the time of the Catilinarian conspiracy. He was

  • figural aftereffect (psychology)

    perception: Context effects: …some of them interpreted so-called figural aftereffects within a Gestaltist model of brain functioning. Figural aftereffects refer to changes in the perceived shape or location of a figure following its inspection; for example, a curved line will appear to get straighter after prolonged inspection. Or the distance between two parallel…

  • figurate number (mathematics)

    number game: Polygonal and other figurate numbers: Among the many relationships of numbers that have fascinated man are those that suggest (or were derived from) the arrangement of points representing numbers into series of geometrical figures. Such numbers, known as figurate or polygonal numbers, appeared in 15th-century arithmetic books and…

  • figure (art)

    Chinese painting: Sui (581–618) and Tang (618–907) dynasties: …a profound influence, particularly on figure painting, in the Tang and Song dynasties. His style may be reflected in some of the 8th-century caves at Dunhuang, although the meticulous handling of the great paradise compositions in the caves increasingly came to approximate the high standards of Chinese court artists and…

  • Figure (work by Lipchitz)

    Jacques Lipchitz: …more monumental scale, as in Figure (1926–30). With such transparents as The Couple (1928–29), Lipchitz attempted to express emotion instead of merely addressing formal concerns, as he had in his earlier works.

  • figure (syllogistic)

    figure, in logic, the classification of syllogisms according to the arrangement of the middle term, namely, the term (subject or predicate of a proposition) that occurs in both premises but not in the conclusion. There are four figures: In the first figure the middle term is the subject of the

  • Figure (horse)

    Morgan: …by a horse known as Justin Morgan, after his owner. Though the horse died in 1821, his individual stamp still persists. He stood approximately 14 hands (56 inches, or 142 cm) high and was a compact, active, and virile horse whose pedigree was probably a blend of Thoroughbred and Arabian,…

  • figure poem (poetic form)

    pattern poetry, verse in which the typography or lines are arranged in an unusual configuration, usually to convey or extend the emotional content of the words. Of ancient (probably Eastern) origin, pattern poems are found in the Greek Anthology, which includes work composed between the 7th century

  • figure skate (sports equipment)

    figure skating: Boots and blades: The figure skate’s blade is about 3 16 inch (4 mm) thick. It is hollow-ground to emphasize its two edges, although the skater usually uses only one edge at a time. The front of the blade, called the toe pick, contains serrations, which are planted into…

  • figure skating (sport)

    figure skating, sport in which ice skaters, singly or in pairs, perform freestyle movements of jumps, spins, lifts, and footwork in a graceful manner. (Read Britannica’s biography of Scott Hamilton.) Figure skating derives its name from the patterns (or figures) skaters make on the ice, an element

  • figure waterskiing (sport)

    waterskiing: For trick or figure waterskiing, skis are shorter than the regular skis and have no fins, permitting the skier to turn around completely during the performance of stunts. In competition, trick water-skiers are required to perform on both two skis and the monoski, on flat water and on…

  • Figure with Nganga (sculpture by Mendieta)

    Ana Mendieta: Later works: For her floor sculptures, including Figure with Nganga (1984) and Untitled (1983–84), she formed abstract female figures using sand and soil imported from such locations as Cuba, the Nile in Egypt, and the Red Sea. The result seemingly brought her Silueta practice indoors. Mendieta also created freestanding sculptures during this…

  • figure-ground illusion (psychology)

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