A-Z Browse

  • “I” (ancient Chinese text)
    an ancient Chinese text, one of the Five Classics (Wujing) of Confucianism. The main body of the work, traditionally attributed to Wenwang (flourished 12th century bc), contains a discussion of the divinatory system used by the Zhou dynasty wizards. A supplementary section of “commentaries” is believed to be the work of...
  • I (chemical element)
    chemical element, a member of the halogen elements, or Group 17 (Group VIIa) of the periodic table....
  • I AM (religious concept)
    The church believes in the I AM, or God Presence, which members believe is the higher, changeless aspect of every individual. Church members may call upon the I AM presence through the repetition of invocational prayers called decrees. As a result of the messages Elizabeth Clare Prophet reputedly received from the Masters, she synthesized insights from all the major religious traditions in the......
  • I Am America (And So Can You!) (work by Colbert)
    ...(2003) with Sedaris and Dinello and starred with them in a feature film adaptation of Strangers with Candy (2005). In 2007 Colbert published I Am America (And So Can You!), in which he used his television-pundit persona to comment on—and frequently deride—various aspects of American society, including religion, the......
  • I Am Charlotte Simmons (work by Wolfe)
    ...Stooges, a scandalous diatribe about John Updike, Norman Mailer, and John Irving, who had all been critical of A Man in Full. Wolfe’s third novel, I Am Charlotte Simmons (2004), examines modern-day student life at fictional Dupont University through the eyes of small-town protagonist Charlotte Simmons....
  • I AM movement (American religious movement)
    theosophical movement founded in Chicago in the early 1930s by Guy W. Ballard (1878–1939), a mining engineer, and his wife, Edna W. Ballard (1886–1971). The name of the movement is a reference to the Bible verse in which God replies to Moses, “I am who I am” (Exodus 3:14). Despite legal and public relations difficulties, the movemen...
  • I Am Sam (film by Nelson)
    ...Lovely (1997), for which he was named best actor at the Cannes film festival, and later garnered Oscar nominations for Sweet and Lowdown (1999) and I Am Sam (2001). Another impressive directorial effort came with The Pledge. The drama featured Jack Nicholson as a police detective who vows to find a child kil...
  • “I Am So Wild About Your Strawberry Mouth” (autobiography by Kinski)
    Kinski had a self-cultivated image of hedonism and excess, which was reflected in his autobiography Ich bin so wild nach deinem Erdbeermund (1975; “I Am So Wild About Your Strawberry Mouth”; rereleased in 1988 as Kinski Uncut). He disdained his chosen profession, once saying, “I wish I’d never been an actor. I’d r...
  • I and the Village (painting by Chagall)
    ...and designer. He composed his images based on emotional and poetic associations, rather than on rules of pictorial logic. Predating Surrealism, his early works, such as I and the Village (1911), were among the first expressions of psychic reality in modern art. His works in various media include sets for plays and ballets, etchings illustrating the Bible, and......
  • I and Thou (work by Buber)
    This basic view underlies Buber’s mature thinking; it was expressed with great philosophic and poetic power in his famous work Ich und Du (1923; I and Thou). According to this view, God, the great Thou, enables human I–Thou relations between man and other beings. Their measure of mutuality is related to the levels of being: it is almost nil on the inorganic and botanic....
  • I band (physiology)
    ...at different levels of the sarcomere are examined by electron microscope, the filaments can be seen end-on, and the three-dimensional nature of the lattice of filaments can be appreciated. The I band contains only thin filaments, with a diameter of 6 to 8 nm. In the A band, in the overlap region, the thin filaments appear with thick ones (diameter of 12 nm) in an extremely regular pattern......
  • I beam (mineralogy)
    ...in the unit cell. The structure of a monoclinic amphibole viewed down the c crystallographic axis is shown in Figure 4A. The tetrahedral-octahedral-tetrahedral (t-o-t) strips, also known as I beams, are approximately twice as wide in the b direction as the equivalent t-o-t strips in pyroxenes because of the doubling of the chains in the amphiboles. The t-o-t I beams are......
  • I Believe I Can Fly (song by Kelly)
    ...laced with hip-hop rhythms. Subsequent efforts achieved progressively greater success as Kelly’s dominance of the rhythm-and-blues market translated into pop stardom. His ballad I Believe I Can Fly (1996) was a massive hit and earned three Grammy Awards, including best rhythm-and-blues song....
  • I brønden og i tjernet (work by Moe)
    ...base on which the future could build but a needed sense of national identity. Moe also wrote specifically for children. His poems are part of Norwegian childhood, and his nature fantasy I brønden og i tjernet (“In the Well and the Lake,” 1851) made Viggo and his little sister Beate familiar for more than a century. Equally enduring are the fairy tales and......
  • I Can See for Miles (song by the Who)
    ...the Who were primarily a singles group. They were, however, more successful in this regard in Britain (eight Top Ten hits between 1965 and 1967) than in the United States (I Can See for Miles, released in 1967, was the group’s only Billboard Top Ten single). It was the 1969 rock opera Tommy—and a......
  • “I cancelliraadens dage” (work by Andersen)
    ...it was the work of the German playwright and critic Gotthold E. Lessing that sparked Andersen’s interest in literature and style. In his main work, I cancelliraadens dage (1897; In the Days of the Councillor), short stories tied together by their central figure, Andersen portrayed the world of rural civil servants in Norway. His other novel, Mot......
  • I Can’t Get Started (work by Duke)
    ...noted for his sophisticated melodies for films, Broadway musicals, and revues. Among his most popular songs are “April in Paris” from the revue Walk a Little Faster (1932) and “I Can’t Get Started” from Ziegfeld Follies of 1936....
  • I Can’t Help Myself (song by the Four Tops)
    ...Holland, Lamont Dozier, and Eddie Holland), the Four Tops became consistent hit makers, registering their first hit, Baby I Need Your Loving, in 1964. I Can’t Help Myself (number one on the pop and rhythm-and-blues charts in the United States) and It’s the Same Old Song followed in 1965, establishing the gr...
  • I Carbonari (Italian secret society member)
    (Italian dialect: Charcoal Burner), in early 19th-century Italy, member of a secret society (the Carbonaria) advocating liberal and patriotic ideas. The group provided the main source of opposition to the conservative regimes imposed on Italy by the victorious allies after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815. Their influence prepared the way for the Risorgimento movement, which resulted in Italian uni...
  • “I Ching” (ancient Chinese text)
    an ancient Chinese text, one of the Five Classics (Wujing) of Confucianism. The main body of the work, traditionally attributed to Wenwang (flourished 12th century bc), contains a discussion of the divinatory system used by the Zhou dynasty wizards. A supplementary section of “commentaries” is believed to be the work of...
  • I, Claudius (novel by Graves)
    ...critic, and classical scholar who carried on many of the formal traditions of English verse in a period of experimentation. His more than 120 books also include a notable historical novel, I, Claudius (1934); an autobiographical classic of World War I, Good-Bye to All That (1929; rev. ed. 1957); and erudite, controversial studies in mythology....
  • I Corps (United States Army corps)
    ...character. By 1913 he was a brigadier general and president of the War College. Arriving in France with the Allied Expeditionary Force (AEF) in October 1917, Liggett took command of the U.S. Army’s I Corps on Jan. 20, 1918—a sign of the high esteem that the AEF commanding general, John J. Pershing, had for him, in spite of Liggett’s strong dissent from Pershing’s com...
  • I Found a Love (song by Pickett)
    Pickett’s switch to secular music came quickly. As a member of the Falcons, a hardcore rhythm-and-blues vocal group, he sang lead on his own composition I Found a Love (1962), one of the songs that interested Atlantic Records producer Jerry Wexler in Pickett as a solo artist. “Pickett was a pistol,” said Wexler, who nicknamed him “the Wicked......
  • I Got Rhythm (work by Gershwin)
    ...in his later success. Miller formed his first band in 1937; it attracted little notice, but some of its recordings were admired by critics, especially Miller’s arrangement of I Got Rhythm, with its use of countermelody and multiple false endings....
  • I Got Up (work by Kawara)
    Another of his projects, the I Got Up series of the 1970s, consists of dated postcards that he mailed to colleagues around the world and then reassembled for exhibition purposes. On each postcard he informed the recipient of the precise time he awoke on the day he mailed the card....
  • I Got You Babe (song by Sonny and Cher)
    ...she met entertainer and songwriter Salvatore (“Sonny”) Bono, whom she married in 1964. The couple began singing together, and their first big pop hit came in 1965 with I Got You Babe, which sold more than three million copies. The duo went on to score a number of hits, but by the late 1960s their popularity had begun to fade. A jump start came in 1971 with...
  • I Just Called to Say I Love You (song by Wonder)
    ...FieldsArt Direction: Patrizia Von Brandenstein for AmadeusOriginal Score: Maurice Jarre for A Passage to IndiaBest Adaptation Score: Prince for Purple RainOriginal Song: “I Just Called to Say I Love You” from The Woman in Red; music and lyrics by Stevie WonderHonorary Award: National Endowment for the Arts and James Stewart...
  • I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (work by Angelou)
    ...and Jamaica Kincaid; the poetry of Audre Lorde, June Jordan, and Rita Dove; and the drama of Ntozake Shange. The remarkable sustained popularity of Maya Angelou’s autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1970), one of the most widely read and taught books by an African American woman, demonstrates the lasting appeal to white as well as black American reade...
  • I Led Three Lives (work by Philbrick)
    ...leaders who had been indicted in part on evidence he had provided. All 11 were found guilty, and Philbrick became a public figure. In 1952 he published a record of his undercover work called I Led Three Lives, which became a best-seller....
  • I li (Chinese ritual text)
    collection of Chinese rituals probably compiled during Western Han times (206 bc–ad 8) and listed, along with two other ritual texts (Li chi, “Collection of Rituals”; Chou li, “Rites of Chou”), among the Nine, Twelve, and Thirteen Classics of Confucianism. Its subject matter is somewhat different from the other ritual cla...
  • I Lost It at the Movies (work by Kael)
    ...buffs and fellow critics for honest, lively, and penetrating criticism led to the publication in 1965 of a collection of her articles in book form under the characteristic title I Lost It at the Movies. The book was a best-seller and won her assignments from such major general-circulation magazines as Life, ......
  • I Love Lucy (American television program)
    radio and motion-picture actress and longtime comedy star of American television, best remembered for her classic television comedy series I Love Lucy....
  • I Need to Wake Up (song by Etheridge)
    ...LabyrinthArt Direction: Eugenio Caballero (art direction) and Pilar Revuelta (set decoration) for Pan’s LabyrinthOriginal Score: Gustavo Santaolalla for BabelOriginal Song: “I Need to Wake Up” from An Inconvenient Truth; music and lyrics by Melissa EtheridgeAnimated Feature Film: Happy Feet, directed by George......
  • I novel (Japanese literature)
    form or genre of 20th-century Japanese literature that is characterized by self-revealing narration, with the author usually as the central character....
  • I/O device (computer technology)
    any of various devices (including sensors) used to enter information and instructions into a computer for storage or processing and to deliver the processed data to a human operator or, in some cases, a machine controlled by the computer. Such devices make up the peripheral equipment of modern digital computer systems....
  • I/O unit (computer technology)
    any of various devices (including sensors) used to enter information and instructions into a computer for storage or processing and to deliver the processed data to a human operator or, in some cases, a machine controlled by the computer. Such devices make up the peripheral equipment of modern digital computer systems....
  • I Olympiad, Games of the (1896)
    The inaugural Games of the modern Olympics were attended by as many as 280 athletes, all male, coming from 12 countries. The athletes competed in 43 events covering athletics (track and field), cycling, swimming, gymnastics, weightlifting, wrestling, fencing, shooting, and tennis. A festive atmosphere prevailed as foreign athletes were greeted with parades and banquets. A crowd estimated at......
  • I Olympic Winter Games (1924)
    The Chamonix Games were originally staged as International Winter Sports Week, a meet sponsored by the IOC but not sanctioned as an official Olympic Games. Well-organized and equipped with new facilities, the event was a success and led the IOC to amend its charter in 1925, establishing the Winter Games. Chamonix was thereafter recognized as the first Winter Olympics....
  • I proposition (logic)
    I:particular affirmativeSome A’s are B’s....
  • i region (electronics)
    A p-i-n diode is a p-n junction with an impurity profile tailored so that an intrinsic layer, the “i region,” is sandwiched between a p layer and an n layer. The p-i-n diode has found wide application in microwave circuits. It can be used as a microwave switch with essentially constant depletion-layer capacitance......
  • I Remember Mama (film by Stevens)
    ...later films were praised for effective camera work and overall visual composition, for the careful integration of music and visuals, and for the skillful handling of sentimental themes. Although I Remember Mama (1948), his first postwar picture, idealized the past, it is praised for its realistic background and emotional restraint. He won the Academy Award for best directing for A......
  • I, Rigoberta Menchú (work by Menchú)
    Menchú gained international prominence in 1983 with her widely translated book I, Rigoberta Menchú, in which she tells the story of her impoverished youth and recounts in horrifying detail the torture-murders of her brother and mother. She received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992 for her continuing efforts to achieve social justice and mutual reconciliation......
  • I, Robot (work by Asimov)
    ...which recounts the collapse and rebirth of a vast interstellar empire in the universe of the future, is his most famous work of science fiction. In the short-story collection I, Robot (1950; filmed 2004), he developed a set of ethics for robots and intelligent machines that greatly influenced other writers’ treatment of the subject. His other novels and collectio...
  • I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold (painting by Demuth)
    ...by the severely hard-edged abstraction of buildings. Among Demuth’s best-known works are his poster portraits such as the tribute to the poet William Carlos Williams, I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold....
  • I See a Wondrous Land (novel by Kamban)
    ...investigation of the life of the daughter of the 17th-century Icelandic bishop Brynjólfur Sveinsson. Another important work is Jeg ser et stort skönt land (1936; I See a Wondrous Land), a historical novel set in the 11th century that recounts the Viking expeditions to Greenland and America. Kamban’s first plays—Hadda Padda....
  • I See All (encyclopaedia by Mee)
    ...much of the success of the work as a reference tool resulted from its splendidly contrived index, which remains a model of its kind. Mee later produced a completely pictorial encyclopaedia, I See All (1928–30), that comprised thousands of small illustrations, each accompanied by only a few words of text. Librarians treasured it for its reference value. In 1917–18 a......
  • i: six nonlectures (work by Cummings)
    ...which confirmed his individualist repugnance for collectivism. He published his discussions as the Charles Eliot Norton lecturer on poetry at Harvard University (1952–53) under the title i: six nonlectures (1953)....
  • I, The Jury (novel by Spillane)
    Spillane began his career by writing for pulp magazines and comic books in order to pay for his schooling. His first novel—I, The Jury (1947)—introduced detective Mike Hammer, who appeared in other works, such as My Gun Is Quick (1950) and The Big Kill (1951). Kiss Me, Deadly (1952)......
  • I, The Supreme (book by Roa Bastos)
    Roa Bastos’s most ambitious work, the novel Yo, el supremo (1974; I, the Supreme, in bilingual edition), is based on the life of Francia and covers more than a hundred years of Paraguayan history....
  • I think, therefore I am (philosophy)
    (Latin: “I think, therefore I am”), dictum coined in 1637 by René Descartes as a first step in demonstrating the attainability of certain knowledge. It is the only statement to survive the test of his methodic doubt. The statement is indubitable, Descartes argued, because even if an all-powerful demon were to try to deceive me into thinkin...
  • I, Tina (work by Turner and Loder)
    ...20 million copies worldwide. She followed her musical success with a role in the film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985), and she wrote her autobiography, I, Tina (1986; adapted as the film What’s Love Got to Do with It, 1993). Later albums include Break Every Rule (1986), ......
  • I Wanna Love My Life Away (song by Pitney)
    In 1961 Pitney began recording his compositions, with I Wanna Love My Life Away demonstrating a passionate vocal style. However, he sold more records with songs by other writers, such as Town Without Pity and Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance; the latter rendition rose to number four in ...
  • I Want to Live! (film by Wise [1958])
    Other Nominees...
  • I Wanted a Year Without Fall (novel by Busch)
    Busch’s first novel, I Wanted a Year Without Fall, was published in 1971. It centres on two men who are running from their problems. In his second novel, Manual Labor (1974), a married couple grapples with a miscarriage. The same characters reappear in Rounds (1979), in which their lives are intertwined......
  • I Was Cicero (work by Bazna)
    ...was written by L.C. Moyzisch, who transmitted all communications between Cicero and Papen. A motion picture, Five Fingers (1952), was based on this book. Ich war Cicero (1962; I Was Cicero) was written by Bazna himself (under his real name) in collaboration with Hans Nogly....
  • I Will Marry When I Want (work by Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Ngugi wa Mirii)
    ...cowritten with Micere Githae Mugo, is considered by some critics to be his best. He was also coauthor, with Ngugi wa Mirii, of a play first written in Kikuyu, Ngaahika Ndeenda (1977; I Will Marry When I Want), the performance of which led to his detention for a year without trial by the Kenyan government. (His book Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary, which was publish...
  • I Would Have Saved Them If I Could (short story by Michaels)
    ...of the University of California, Berkeley, in the 1970s. Many of the stories in his first two volumes of short fiction—Going Places (1969) and I Would Have Saved Them if I Could (1975)—contain bizarre stories of hostile urban life, replete with fantasy, sexual incident, and violence. The tales often centre on Phillip Liebowitz,......
  • I-16 (Soviet aircraft)
    ...advantages of monoplanes with unbraced wings and retractable landing gear were evident, and fighters of this description began to appear. The first of these to see operational service was the Soviet I-16, designed by Nikolay Polikarpov. The I-16 first flew in 1933 and enjoyed considerable success against German and Italian biplanes in the Spanish Civil War of 1936–39. Powered by a radial...
  • I-201 (submarine class)
    ...a large number of submarines of various sizes and types, including aircraft-carrying submarines, midget submarines, and “human torpedoes” carried by larger submarines. The Japanese I-201 class was a high-speed submarine, of 259 feet and 1,291 tons displacement, that had diesel propulsion for 15 knots on the surface; while underwater, large batteries and electric motors could......
  • I-ch’ang (China)
    city, western Hubei sheng (province), China. It extends along the left bank of the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang), at a point marking the division between the river’s middle and lower courses. A number of hills rise directly behind the city, and the small island of Xiba forms a harbour in the river....
  • “I-Ching” (ancient Chinese text)
    an ancient Chinese text, one of the Five Classics (Wujing) of Confucianism. The main body of the work, traditionally attributed to Wenwang (flourished 12th century bc), contains a discussion of the divinatory system used by the Zhou dynasty wizards. A supplementary section of “commentaries” is believed to be the work of...
  • I-ching (Chinese pilgrim)
    The kingdom of Srivijaya is first mentioned in the writings of the Chinese Buddhist pilgrim I-ching, who visited it in 671 after a voyage of less than 20 days from Canton. He was on the first stage of his journey to the great teaching centre of Nalanda in northeastern India. The ruler of Srivijaya assisted I-ching on his journey....
  • I-ch’un (China)
    city, north-central Heilongjiang sheng (province), far northeastern China. It is situated in the densely forested area of the Xiao Hinggan (Lesser Khingan) Range, at the confluence of the Yichun River (from which the city takes its name) and the Tangwang River, a tributary of the Sungari (Songhua) River...
  • i-go (game)
    board game for two players. Of East Asian origin, it is popular in China, Korea, and especially Japan, the country with which it is most closely identified. Go, probably the world’s oldest board game, is thought to have originated in China some 4,000 years ago. According to some sources, this date is as early as 2356 bc, but it is more lik...
  • I-ho ch’üan (Chinese secret society)
    officially supported peasant uprising of 1900 that attempted to drive all foreigners from China. “Boxers” was a name that foreigners gave to a Chinese secret society known as the Yihequan (“Righteous and Harmonious Fists”). The group practiced certain boxing and calisthenic rituals in the belief that this made them invulnerable. It was thought to be an offshoot of the.....
  • I-ho t’uan (Chinese secret society)
    officially supported peasant uprising of 1900 that attempted to drive all foreigners from China. “Boxers” was a name that foreigners gave to a Chinese secret society known as the Yihequan (“Righteous and Harmonious Fists”). The group practiced certain boxing and calisthenic rituals in the belief that this made them invulnerable. It was thought to be an offshoot of the.....
  • I-hsing ware (Chinese pottery)
    The stoneware of I-hsing in Kiangsu Province was known in the West as Buccaro, or Boccaro, ware and was copied and imitated at Meissen, at Staffordshire, and in the Netherlands by Ary de Milde and others. Its teapots were much valued in 17th century Europe, where tea was newly introduced. The wares of I-hsing are unglazed, the body varying from red to dark brown. The molding is extremely......
  • i-hua (art)
    ...traditionalism, writing that his own method was “no method” and insisting that, like nature, creativity with the brush must be spontaneous and seamless, based on the concept of i-hua, the “unifying line.”...
  • I-It (philosophy)
    ...day between the maximum of good that can be done in a concrete situation and the minimum of evil that must be done in it—calls for an I–Thou relation whenever possible and settles for an I–It relation whenever necessary—e.g., for the purpose of human survival....
  • I-Lab (research laboratory, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States)
    ...in physics and soon demonstrated his precocity as both a researcher and entrepreneur. As a graduate student he became a national expert on aeronautical and meteorological research instruments. The Instruments Laboratory (I-Lab), which he founded in 1934, became a centre for both academic and commercial research, a combination that was not unusual at the time. It was through the I-Lab that......
  • I-lan (China)
    Heilungkiang was long sparsely inhabited by hunters and fishermen who used canoes, dogsleds, skis, and reindeer as transport. The town of San-hsing (now I-lan) was the home in the early 15th century ad of the ancestors of Nurhachi, the Manchu tribal leader who rose to power in the late 1500s through struggles with rival tribes and alliances with Manchu-related groups. Nurhachi...
  • I-lan (county, Taiwan)
    hsien (county), northeastern Taiwan, occupying an area of 825 square miles (2,137 square km) and bordered by the hsien of T’ai-pei (north), T’ao-yüan and Hsin-chu (west), and T’ai-chung and Hua-lien (south) and by the Philippine Sea (east). The Chung-yang Mountains extend over the southern part, and the Hsüeh-shan Mountains border the northwestern ...
  • I-lan (Taiwan)
    shih (municipality) and seat of I-lan hsien (county), northeastern Taiwan, the centre of the only sizable alluvial basin on the island’s mountainous eastern coast. The basin itself was largely formed as the delta of the Cho-Shui River and is about 30 miles (50 km) from north to south. I-lan city lies in the centre of this plain on the Lan River. The plain is a fertile rice-pro...
  • I-lan River (river, Taiwan)
    ...and by the Philippine Sea (east). The Chung-yang Mountains extend over the southern part, and the Hsüeh-shan Mountains border the northwestern part of I-lan hsien. In the northeast, the I-lan River has formed a fertile triangular basin, where paddy rice, sugarcane, peanuts (groundnuts), and sweet potatoes are grown. Sulfur, manganese, mica, copper, talc, marble, and iron ore are.....
  • I-li Ho (river, Central Asia)
    river in western Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang, China, and southeastern Kazakhstan. It is 870 miles (1,400 km) long and drains the basin between the Tien Shan range to the south and the Borohoro (Poluokenu) Mountains to the north. Both ranges are extremely high. The drainage basin of the Ili and its principal tributaries—the Kax...
  • i-Limb (prosthetic device)
    ...resulting from service in a war zone. With many soldiers surviving the loss of an arm or a leg, there is also the challenge of developing better prosthetics. One example is the bionic hand called i-Limb, which became available to amputees in 2007. The prosthetic has five fully and independently functional fingers and is controlled by a computer chip connected to electrodes that detect......
  • I-lou (people)
    From the Chinese records it is evident that the Yilou, the Tungus ancestors of the Manchu, were essentially hunters, fishers, and food gatherers, though in later times they and their descendants, the Juchen and Manchu, developed a primitive form of agriculture and animal husbandry. The Juchen-Manchu were accustomed to braid their hair into a queue, or pigtail. When the Manchu conquered China......
  • I-n-Salah (Algeria)
    oasis town, central Algeria, on the southern edge of the arid Tademaït Plateau. At the crossing of ancient trans-Saharan caravan routes, it was once an important trade link between northern and central Africa but has declined in modern times owing to high transportation costs and the exodus of workers to the developing gas fields 60 miles (100 km) southwest. Mainly visite...
  • I-ning (China)
    city, western Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang, China. It is the chief city, agricultural market, and commercial centre of the Ili River valley, which is a principal route from the Xinjiang region into Central Asia. The valley is far wetter than any other part of Xinjiang and has rich grazing land. Kuldja has been a strategic centre since early times, being...
  • I-pin (China)
    city, southeastern Sichuan sheng (province), China. It is situated at the southwestern corner of the Sichuan Basin at the junction of the Min and the Yangtze rivers; above Yibin the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang) is called the Jinsha River....
  • I-Thou (philosophical doctrine)
    theological doctrine of the full, direct, mutual relation between beings, as conceived by Martin Buber and some other 20th-century philosophers. The basic and purest form of this relation is that between man and God (the Eternal Thou), which is the model for and makes possible I-Thou relations between human beings. The relation between man and God, however, is always an I-Thou ...
  • I-type granite (geology)
    There are two major source regions for producing molten granite: igneous and sedimentary protoliths (source rocks). These result in I-type granitoids, derived from igneous protoliths and containing moderate amounts of Al2O3 and high amounts of Na2O, and S-type granitoids, derived from sedimentary protoliths and containing high amounts of......
  • I-type granitoid (geology)
    There are two major source regions for producing molten granite: igneous and sedimentary protoliths (source rocks). These result in I-type granitoids, derived from igneous protoliths and containing moderate amounts of Al2O3 and high amounts of Na2O, and S-type granitoids, derived from sedimentary protoliths and containing high amounts of......
  • I-voting (politics)
    As use of the Internet spread rapidly in the 1990s and early 21st century, it seemed that the voting process would naturally migrate there. In this scenario, voters would cast their choices from any computer connected to the Internet—including from their home. This type of voting mechanism is sometimes referred to as I-voting. Beyond voting in regularly scheduled elections, many saw in......
  • I-yang (China)
    city, northern Hunan sheng (province), southeast-central China. The city is situated approximately 47 miles (75 km) northwest of Changsha (the provincial capital) on the Zi River, to the south of Dongting Lake, on the main highway from Changsha to Changde farther to the northwest....
  • i-yang ch’iang (Chinese music)
    The vocal style of k’un-ch’ü matched the soft accompaniment and was usually performed by a male singing falsetto. Another style of opera from the same period, i-yang ch’iang, seemed more appealing to the general public and is noteworthy for its use at some point in its development of a chorus (pang-ch’iang) as well as of soloists. In addition...
  • I.F. Stone’s Weekly (American periodical)
    From the outset I.F. Stone’s Weekly (1953–67; I.F. Stone’s Bi-Weekly, 1967–71) had an influence far greater than the size of its readership. Among early subscribers were Albert Einstein, Bertrand Russell, and Eleanor Roosevelt. The newsletter, staffed only by Stone and his wife, was researched, written, and edited by Stone. It set high journalistic standar...
  • I.J. Asscher and Company (Dutch company)
    ...the colourless stone was purchased by the Transvaal government and was presented (1907) to the reigning British monarch, King Edward VII. It was cut into 9 large stones and about 100 smaller ones by I.J. Asscher and Company of Amsterdam, famed for their cutting of the Excelsior diamond, which until the discovery of the Cullinan had been the largest known diamond. The stones cut from the Cullina...
  • I.M. Pei & Associates (American architectural firm)
    Pei formed his own architectural firm, I.M. Pei & Associates (later Pei Cobb Freed & Partners), in 1955. Among the notable early designs of the firm were the Luce Memorial Chapel, Taiwan; the Mesa Laboratory of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado, which, located near mountains, mimics the broken silhouettes of the surrounding peaks; and the......
  • I.M. Singer Company (American corporation)
    corporation that grew out of the sewing-machine business founded in the United States by Isaac M. Singer....
  • IA channel (biology)
    Another outward K+ current, occurring with little delay after depolarization, is the A current. IA channels are opened by depolarization following hyperpolarization. By increasing the interval between action potentials, they help a neuron to fire repetitively at low frequencies....
  • IAA (chemical compound)
    ...(see below Six-membered rings with one heteroatom). Skatole, a degradation product of tryptophan that retains the indole unit, contributes much of the strong odour of mammalian feces. Indole-3-acetic acid (heteroauxin or β-indolylacetic acid) is a plant-growth regulator and the most important member of the auxin family of plant hormones (see hormone: The hormones of plants)...
  • IAAF (international sports organization)
    track-and-field organization of national associations of more than 160 countries. It was founded as the International Amateur Athletic Association at Stockholm in 1912. In 1936 the IAAF took over regulation of women’s international track-and-field competition from the Fédération Sportive Féminine International, which had been founded in 1921. The major aims of the IAAF ...
  • I’Abane, Francesco (Italian painter)
    Italian painter, one of the 17th-century Bolognese masters trained in the studio of the Carracci. He assisted Guido Reni in a number of major decorative cycles, including that of the Chapel of the Annunciation (1609–12) in the Quirinal Palace and the choir (1612–14) of Santa Maria della Pace....
  • IACC (boat class)
    ...a New Zealander 132-foot (40-metre) monohull, had to be decided in the courts and provoked a redefinition of the rules governing future races. For 1992, a new and faster yacht was designated as the International America’s Cup Class (IACC)—75 feet (23 m) in overall length—to race over an eight-leg 22.6-mile (36.4-kilometre) course. The 1995 event was run over a six-leg,......
  • Iacchus (Greek mythology)
    minor deity associated with the Eleusinian Mysteries, the best known of the ancient Greek mystery religions. On the day preceding the commencement of the mysteries, Iacchus’ name was invoked with the names of the earth goddess Demeter and her daughter Kore (Persephone) during the procession from Athens to Eleusis, a city in Attica. Probably originally a personification of...
  • Iachimo (fictional character)
    ...must marry his horrid stepson Cloten. When Cymbeline learns that Imogen is secretly married to Posthumus, he banishes Posthumus, who heads for Rome. In a conversation with a villainous Italian, Iachimo, Posthumus finds himself drawn unwisely into betting Iachimo that Imogen’s fidelity to her marriage is unassailable. Journeying to England, Iachimo furtively obtains from the sleeping Imog...
  • Iacocca, Lee (American businessman)
    American automobile executive who, as president and chairman of the board of the foundering Chrysler Corporation, secured the largest amount of federal financial assistance ever given to a private corporation at that time....
  • Iacocca, Lido Anthony (American businessman)
    American automobile executive who, as president and chairman of the board of the foundering Chrysler Corporation, secured the largest amount of federal financial assistance ever given to a private corporation at that time....
  • Iacopone da Todi (Italian poet)
    ...Boniface were many of the Franciscan “Spirituals” (members of the order founded by St. Francis of Assisi who followed a literal observance of his rule of poverty), including the poet Iacopone da Todi, some of whose poems were written during his imprisonment by Boniface....

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