:: wikimiki.org ::

Little People

Little People

This article is about a toy brand. For the condition of dwarfism and the Little People of America organization, see Dwarfism. Little People is the name of a toy brand, produced since the 1960s, originally by Fisher-Price. Classic Little People figures have no arms or legs, their bodies and head shapes are circular, and they come in black and white skin colors. Little People toys also include dogs. Newer figures are larger and have more detail to their bodies, including defined arms and legs, while retaining an overall cylindrical shape.

History

dog Fisher-Price produced wooden toy dogs for four decades before deciding to try their new line of toys. The first Little People set included a school bus together with characters. The toy gained instant popularity and other sets soon came out. At first, Little People characters were produced with wood; plastic was used for their vehicles and buildings. In the middle 1970s, Fisher-Price produced the Sesame Street town, with various Sesame Street stores, a bridge with stop lights and Sesame Street characters such as Bert and Ernie. Soon after, the Little People Discovery Airport, a hospital and a school would also be released. Little People characters had by then been also produced with plastic products exclusively. After Fisher-Price was bought over by Mattel in the 1990s, Little People reappeared on the markets, their figure slightly larger in size from the original Little People characters due to revised toy safety guidelines. These figures are called "chunky" by collectors. Later, the company revised the shape of the figures, making them much more detailed and focusing on various configurations of five characters named Eddie, Sarah Lynn, Maggie, Michael, and Sonya lee.

Likenesses

Although Fisher-Price never actually reproduced the figure of a real-life celebrity with the Little People line, some have argued that many of the Little People toys, particularly during the 1970s, resembled super-stars of their era, more famously their Black female singer ( like Donna Summer) and a Black male whose face resembled that of famous boxer Earnie Shavers.

Dwarfism

Dwarfism is a condition in which a person, animal or plant is much below the ordinary size of the species. When applied to people, it implies not just extreme shortness, but a degree of disproportion. Dwarfism is now rarely used as a medical term and is sometimes (but not always) considered impolite or pejorative. Today, the term little person tends to be preferred. According to the Little People of America the human definition of this term is stated as such "a medical or genetic condition that usually results in an adult height of 4'10" or shorter, among both men and women, although in some cases a person with a dwarfing condition may be slightly taller than that." Of the hundreds of causes of dwarfism in humans, most are genetic, and most involve single gene variations that affect the structure or metabolism of bone, cartilage, or connective tissue. This class of disorder is referred to by physicians as skeletal dysplasias. Chondrodystrophies, chondrodysplasias, osteochondrodystrophies are also used (fairly interchangeably) in the medical literature to refer to most of these conditions. In many of these conditions, the bones are the primary affected body part, and the person is otherwise healthy. In many others, the genetic difference affects other body systems, causing unusual features or other major problems. Achondroplasia is one of the most common and perhaps the most easily recognized skeletal dysplasia. It affects approximately 1 in 40,000 children, both males and females as it is due to a mutation of an autosomal gene.

Problems faced by people with these conditions

- Social and employment opportunities are greatly reduced, regardless of anti-discrimination laws. Self-esteem and family relationships are often affected.
- Extreme shortness can interfere with ordinary activities of daily living, like driving or even using countertops built for taller people.
- Many can have problems produced by the abnormal bone structures. Early degenerative joint disease, exaggerated lordosis or scoliosis, and constriction of spinal cord or nerve roots can cause pain and disability. Reduced thoracic size can restrict lung growth and reduce pulmonary function.
- Many of the conditions are associated with disordered function of other organs, such as brain or liver. These problems can be more disabling than the abnormal bone growth.

Diagnosis

Shortness is usually the concern that brings the child to medical attention. Dwarfism becomes suspected because of obvious physical features, because of an obviously affected parent, or because body measurements (arm span, upper to lower segment ratio) indicate disproportion. Bone x-rays are often the key to recognition of specific skeletal dysplasia. Most children with suspected skeletal dysplasias will be referred to a genetics clinic for diagnostic confirmation and genetic counselling. See [http://www.dwarfism.org/ www.dwarfism.org] for a list of American referral centers with special expertise in skeletal dysplasias. In the last decade, genetic tests for some of the specific disorders have become available.

Medical treatment

For many forms of dwarfism, the best medical treatment that can be offered is accurate diagnosis, prognosis, and genetic counselling information. Treatments to enhance height have major drawbacks. Growth hormone treatment has been shown to accelerate growth velocity over 1-2 years, but it may make a relatively small difference in adult height and involves years of expensive injections. The Ilizarov limb lengthening surgery was pioneered in Russia in the 1970s and is now performed in many places. Other newer devices such as the orthofix and intramedullary skeletal kinetic distractor (ISKD) are also used for limb lengthening. It can add over 6 inches (15 cm) per bone (there are two in the leg), but is expensive, painful, and time-consuming. Some insurance companies may be willing to cover the cost. Each procedure lasts around 8-12 months. Typically two bones are done at a time (the same one on each side), but a patient can do more than that if they're willing to endure the extra pain and inconvenience. Orthopedic or neurosurgical operations may be needed for specific problems associated with some of the conditions. In the last decade, enzyme replacement treatments have been devised for a few of the inherited metabolic diseases, most of which involve more severe problems than short bones.

Terminology

Little person (as opposed to big person), and short-statured are currently preferred terms to refer to a person with extreme, disproportionate shortness. Dwarf is sometimes perceived as having negative connotations, although the term is often used by those affected. The plural is dwarfs — dwarves is used only for the imaginary creature. In the 19th century both dwarf and midget were ordinary medical terms referring to persons of disproportionate and proportionate shortness, respectively. Like many other older medical terms, they became primarily pejorative as they entered popular use. Midget is now considered offensive in all contexts to most, but not all, little people.

Dwarfism and extreme shortness in popular culture and the arts

Midget Dwarfism is such an obvious difference that it attracts curiosity, humor, and imagination. People have paid just to look at dwarfs or to keep them around for amusement (e.g., dwarf tossing). In many times and places this may be the most attractive employment option available, as was the case for some jesters of medieval Europe. When depicted in art, literature, or movies, dwarfs are rarely depicted as "regular people who are very short" but often as a species apart. Novelists, artists, and moviemakers attach special moral or aesthetic significance to the "apartness" or the misshapenness. Artistic representations of dwarfism can be found on Greek vases and other ancient artifacts. Many European paintings (especially Spanish) of the 16th-19th centuries depict dwarfs by themselves or with others. Several novels have treated dwarfism as a major theme, not necessarily realistically:
- The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel) by Günter Grass
- Stones of the River by Ursula Hegi
- The Dwarf by Pär Lagerkvist
- A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
- Son of the Circus by John Irving Leslie Fiedler's Freaks: Myths and Images of the Secret Self (1979) is considered an intelligent and sensitive exploration of the cultural significance and artistic treatments of differentness. Other readers may feel that he valued physically unusual people for their differentness, not for their personhood, when he laments medical treatment for reducing the number of picturesquely different people around. Several twentieth century movies have addressed the topic or made much use of dwarfs:
- Freaks (1932)
- The Terror of Tiny Town (1938)
- The Wizard of Oz (1939)
- Even Dwarfs Started Small (Auch Zwerge haben klein angefangen) (1970)
- The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel) (1979)
- Time Bandits (1981)
- Willow (1988)
- Simon Birch (1998)
- The Station Agent (2003) The 1960s television series The Wild Wild West featured a dwarf, Michael Dunn, as the recurring character Dr. Miguelito Loveless, the brilliant but insane arch-enemy of Secret Service agents James West and Artemus Ward. In addition, the actor and stunt man Verne Troyer has become famous playing the character "Mini-Me" in the two most recent Austin Powers movies, Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) and Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002).

Famous people with dwarfism

- Jason Acuña, Wee-Man US actor
- Michael J. Anderson, US actor
- Kenny Baker, actor who portrayed R2-D2
- Billy Barty, US actor
- Bushwick Bill, US musician, founding member of The Geto Boys
- Sebastiano Biavati, 17th century curator of museum of curiosities
- Joseph Boruwlaski, Polish "count"
- Joe C., Kid Rock's sidekick
- Caroline Crachami, Sicilian dwarf
- Warwick Davis, UK actor
- Peter Dinklage, US actor
- Meredith Eaton, US actor
- The Doll Family, German-born siblings
- Josh Ryan Evans, US actor
- Nicholas Feny. French-born court dwarf
- Charles Flato, American writer and Soviet spy, he was also hunchbacked
- Phil Fondacaro, US Actor
- Eddie Gaedel, made one plate appearance for the St. Louis Browns in 1951
- Jeffrey Hudson, English court dwarf and jester to Charles I
- Martin Klebba, US actor
- Wybrand Lolkes, Dutch dwarf
- George Washington Morrison Nutt, "Commodore Nutt"
- Alexander Pope, poet
- Bridget Powers, Porn Star
- Meinhardt Raabe, oldest surviving munchkin from "The Wizard of Oz"
- David Rappaport, UK & US actor
- Judy-Lynn del Rey, US science fiction editor
- Timothy Roman, the son of US actress Susan Cabot
- Zelda Rubinstein, US actress
- Felix Silla, US actor
- Charles Proteus Steinmetz, scientist and engineer
- Charles Sherwood Stratton, "General Tom Thumb"
- Verne Troyer, US actor
- Hervé Villechaize, French-born actor
- Lavinia Warren, US
- Chick Webb, big band drummer

External links

- [http://www.dwarfism.org/ www.dwarfism.org]
- [http://www.lpaonline.org/ Little People of America]
- [http://www.mcllr.com/ International Center for Limb Lengthening]
- [http://www.shortsupport.org www.shortsupport.org] for a variety of information related to short stature, and a somewhat cautionary view of limb lengthening surgery. Category:Growth disorders

List of toy brands

Children have, probably since the beginning of human kind, always needed something to entertain themselves with. There are accounts as far back as the biblical times of children playing with various forms of toys. Realizing the need for children to be entertained, many companies and brands of toys have popped into the market, particularly during the 19th and 20th centuries. The toys they produce can be placed in a large list of different categories. Here is a partial list of toy brands and/or companies:

Action figures

- Action Man
- Bendos
- Dukes of Hazzard
- G.I. Joe
- Green Soldiers
- Kung Fu
- Masters of the Universe
- Power Rangers
- Rambo
- RoboCop
- Rocky
- Star Trek
- Star Wars
- Starting Lineups
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Board games

Major Board Game brands

- Parker Brothers
- Ravensburger
- Intellect Games
- Milton Bradley Company

Popular Games

- Candy Land
- Life
- Monopoly
- Risk
- Sorry!
- Scrabble
- Operation
- Trouble

Die-Cast toys

- Corgi
- Dee Toys
- Dinky Toy
- Dyna-Flytes
- Hot Wheels
- Maisto
- Majorette
- Matchbox
- Muki
- Tonka
- Lone Star
- Racing Champions

Dolls

- Barbie
- Blythe
- Bratz
- Lizzie McGuire
- Mary-Kate and Ashley
- My Little Pony
- Razanne
- Sabrina the teenage witch
- Sailor Moon
- Sindy
- Strawberry Shortcake
- Cabbage Patch Kids
- Raggedy Ann
- Mr. Potato Head

Educational

- Bob the Builder
- Crayola
- Fisher-Price
- Fuzzy felt
- LeapFrog

General brands/toy companies

- Kid Galaxy
- Louis Marx and Company
- MacFarlane
- Mattel
- Hasbro
- Wham-O

Model toys

- Airfix
- Erector Set
- Hasegawa
- LEGO
- Lincoln Logs
- Lionel Trains
- Meccano
- Mega Bloks
- K'NEX
- Nostalgair
- Playmobil
- Revell
- Schabak
- Tinkertoy
- Tyco Toys
- Wooster

Sports toys

- Koosh ball
- Nerf
- Schwinn

Video games

- Atari
- Nintendo
- PlayStation
- Sega
- Microsoft Xbox Category:Lists of brands Category:Lists of companies by industry
-

Fisher-Price

Fisher-Price is a well-known brand of toys, with headquarters located in East Aurora, New York. The company is a division of Mattel. One of the better-known lines of Fisher-Price is their Little People toys, which include various sets of buildings and vehicles with their respective "people" figures, which used to be made of wood and metal but are now made of plastic. The figures, which were once armless and legless but are now molded with more detail, have holes in the bottom allowing them to be used as finger puppets. Fisher-Price also had, during the 1970s and 1980s, a series of full bodied action figures, and currently have a popular line of action figures based on rescue service personnel.

History

Fisher-Price is named after two of the company's three founders, Herman Fisher and Irving Price (the third, Helen Schelle, is unmentioned). In 1930, the three founders went to the International Toy Fair in New York City, bringing 16 toys with them. Fisher-Price was basically dedicated to the making of wooden toy dogs at that time. That tradition continued on for the next four decades. During the 1960s, Fisher-Price began to produce their famous "Little People" line, with items such as schoolbuses, farms, etc. hitting the markets. The Little People toys gained much popularity and quickly replaced the wooden dogs on Fisher-Price's production line. In 1969, Quaker Oats Company bought Fisher-Price. During the 1970s, Little People expanded to include Sesame Street characters on its line, and also the Sesame Street buildings. In 1991, Fisher-Price became independent from Quaker, and in 1993, it merged with Mattel. In 1997, after Mattel acquired the Tyco Toys brand, Mattel decided it would market all of its infant and preschool products under the Fisher-Price name. category:toy companies category:toy companies of the United States Since 1979, Fisher Price has voluntarily recalled 27 of its products due to present or potential hazards.

Caucasian race

:See Caucasian for other uses of the term. The term Caucasian race is used almost exclusively in the United States to refer to people whose ancestry can be traced back to Europe, North Africa, West Asia, South Asia and parts of Central Asia. It was once considered a useful taxonomical categorization of human racial groups based on a presumed common geographic and/or linguistic origin. In the United States, it is currently used primarily as a distinction loosely based on skin color alone for a group commonly refered to as Whites, as defined by the American government and census bureau. In the British Isles, "Caucasian" follows the North American definition, but in continental Europe, "Caucasian" currently refers almost exclusively to people who are from the Caucasus. The term itself derives from measurements in craniology from the 19th century, and its name stems from the region of the Caucasus mountains, itself imagined to be the location from which Noah's son Japheth, traditional Biblical ancestor of the Europeans, established his tribe prior to its supposed migration into Europe. Caucasoid is a term used in physical anthropology to refer to people falling within a certain range of anthropometric measurements. In New Zealand the term Caucasian is used most frequently in police offender descriptions. Pākehā, European New Zealander, or simply New Zealander (although in theory this should include all New Zealanders) is more common in general language.

History of the concept

The concept of a "Caucasian race" or Varietas Caucasia (sic) was first proposed under those names by the German scientist Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (1752-1840). His studies based the classification of the Caucasian race primarily on skull features, which Blumenbach claimed were optimized by the Georgians, a people living in the Southern Caucasus. Populations, formerly called "varieties," are no longer distinguished by Latin names, according to the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. The reason the Caucasus had such an attraction to Blumenbach and other contemporaries was because of its proximity to Mount Ararat, where according to Biblical legend Noah's Ark eventually landed after the Deluge. Blumenbach believed that the original humans were light-skinned, that the Caucasians had retained this whiteness as a constant, and that darkness of skin was a sign of change from the original. The tribe of Japheth was supposed to have originated in the Caucasus, then spread north and westwards. Later anthropologists, including William Z. Ripley in 1899 and Carleton Coon in 1957, further expanded upon the classification of the Caucasian race proposed by Blumenbach, and subdivided the group into Nordic, Alpine, Mediterranean, and at times Dinaric and Baltic subdivisions. Nordicism, the belief that the blond Nordic sub-division constitutes a "master race", was influential in Northern Europe and the United States during the early twentieth century, eventually becoming the official ideology of the Nazi state. It was used to justify eugenics programs and the persecution and extermination of so-called "inferior" races then living in Europe, such as Jews and Roma. The concept of Caucasian race and its stated or implied superiority over other races was often used as a moral excuse for colonialism by Western European countries, in the 19th and 20th centuries. In Europe, usage of the term declined in the 19th century as it did not allow for enough distinctions as required by the new forms of nationalism which were emerging, but in the United States it enjoyed a use which continues to the present. It has been (and is still) used to justify social discrimination in many other places of the world, such as against descendants of Native Americans, African slaves, and immigrants in the Americas and South Africa, non-anglosaxon Australians and many more. Nevertheless it is currently often used in the US as a more "scientific sounding" term for "white", and even used by many anthropologists and geneticists to refer generically to people of European origin.

U.S. Supreme Court rulings

The question of a difference between the "Caucasian race" and "white" as a racial category in the United States has led to at least one set of major legal contradictions in the United States Supreme Court. In the case of Ozawa v. United States (1922), the court ruled that a law which extended U.S. citizenship only to "whites" did not apply to fair-skinned people from Japan, because: :The term "white person", as used in [the law], and in all the earlier naturalization laws, beginning in 1790, applies to such persons as were known in this country as "white," in the racial sense, when it was first adopted, and is confined to persons of the Caucasian Race... A Japanese, born in Japan, being clearly not a Caucasian, cannot be made a citizen of the United States. However a year later, the same court was faced with the trial of United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind (1923), where they ruled that someone from the Indian subcontinent could not become a naturalized United States citizen, because they were not "white". The Court conceded that anthropologists had classified Indians as "Caucasians", and thus the same race as "whites" as defined in Ozawa, but concluded that "the average man knows perfectly well that there are unmistakable and profound differences", and denied citizenship.

Current views

Nowadays, however, views have changed, and large numbers of people do not wish to identify themselves as a particular race. Relatively recent advances in biochemistry have revealed that racial genetic divisions are much smaller than had been previously thought. In places such as Europe, racial censuses are highly controversial and in some cases not used. Some have argued that due to the civil-rights and political-correctness movements, many white people feel a certain guilt or shame when acknowledging their race in a positive manner, although others have dismissed such arguments as racist. The relevance of the term Caucasian to cultural identity and socio-economic patterns is still being debated in the scientific and cultural groups of America. Within strict anthropological discourse the term is useful in identifying a very large group of people who present certain general physical characteristics. They may be very dark south Indians; olive-skined people of the Middle East and Mediteranean region; fair-skinned, light-haired natives of Northern Europe; or immigrant populations from any of these groups in the Americas or Australia. Surprisingly, they are the largest racial population group collectively in the world. The population is about equally split between the darker-skinned people originating in the Indian sub-continent and the lighter-skinned people originating in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.

Books

- Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, On the Natural Varieties of Mankind (1775) — the book that introduced the concept.
- Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure of Man — a history of the pseudoscience of race, skull measurements and IQ inheritability.
- L. Luca Cavalli-Sforza, The History and Geography of Human Genes — a major reference of modern population genetics.
- L. Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Genes, Peoples, and Languages.
- H. F. Augstein, "From the Land of the Bible to the Caucasus and Beyond," in Waltraud Emst and B. Harris, Race, Science and Medicine, 1700-1960 (London: Routledge, 1999): 58-79. Category:Anthropology Category:Race

Dog

Conservation status: DomesticatedCategory:Domesticated animals The dog is a canine mammal of the Order Carnivora that has been domesticated for at least 24,800 years and perhaps for as long as 150,000 years based on recent evidence. In this time, the dog has been developed into hundreds of breeds with a great degree of variation. For example, heights range from just a few inches (such as the Chihuahua) to nearly three feet (such as the Irish Wolfhound), and colors range from white to black, with reds, grays (usually called blue), and browns occurring in a tremendous variation of patterns. Dogs, like humans, are highly social animals and pack hunters; this similarity in their overall behavioral design accounts for their trainability, playfulness, and ability to fit into human households and social situations. Dogs fill a variety of roles in human society and are often trained as working dogs. For dogs that do not have traditional jobs, a wide range of dog sports provide the opportunity to exhibit their natural skills. In many countries, the most common and perhaps most important role of dogs is as companions. Dogs have lived with and worked with humans in so many roles that their loyalty has earned them the sobriquet "man's best friend." Conversely, some cultures consider dogs to be unclean. In other cultures, some dogs are used as food.

Terminology

unclean Dog, in common usage, refers to the domestic dog, Canis lupus familiaris (originally classified as Canis familiaris by Linnaeus in 1758, but reclassified as a subspecies of the wolf, Canis lupus, by the Smithsonian Institution and the American Society of Mammalogists in 1993). The word is sometimes used to refer collectively to any mammal belonging to the family Canidae (as in "the dog family"), such as wolves, foxes and coyotes.
- Dog is also a term used by breeders to specifically denote a male domestic dog.
- Bitch is a female dog who is capable of breeding or has bred.
- Pack is used to denote a group of dogs.
- Puppy is a juvenile dog.
- Pooch, Poochie, Dogay, Pup, Pupsie, Doggy or Doggie are all informal and affectionate terms for a dog often used by children. Many additional terms are used for dogs that are not purebred; see Terms for mixed-breed dogs.

Physical characteristics

Although selective breeding has changed the appearance of many breeds, all dogs retain the basic ingredients from their distant ancestors. Like most predatory mammals, the dog has powerful muscles, a cardiovascular system that supports both sprinting and endurance, and teeth for catching, holding, and tearing. Its skeleton provides the ability to run and leap. They have small, tight feet, walking on their toes. :For details about dog appearance and physical attributes, see dog anatomy.

Intelligence

Among dog lovers, dogs are generally valued for their intelligence. Anecdotal evidence suggests that dogs have a reasonably high intelligence. For a detailed discussion on what dog intelligence is, see dog intelligence.

Diet

dog intelligence Presently, there is academic discussion as to whether domestic dogs are omnivores or carnivores. The classification in the Order Carnivora does not necessarily mean that a dog's diet must be restricted to meat. Unlike an obligate carnivore, such as a cat, a dog is not dependent on meat protein in order to fulfill its dietary requirements. Dogs are able to healthily digest a variety of foods including vegetables and grains, and in fact can consume a large proportion of these in its diet. Wild canines not only eat available plants to obtain key amino acids, but may also obtain nutrients from vegetable matter from the stomach contents of their herbivorous prey. Domestic dogs can survive healthily on a reasonable and carefully designed vegetarian diet, particularly if eggs and milk products are included. In the wild these diets are typically pursued in the absence of available meat. It has also been noted that extremely stressful conditions, such as the Iditarod race and scientific studies of similar conditions, suggest that high-protein diets including meat help prevent damage to muscle tissue. This research is also true of other mammals.

Dangerous substances

Some foods commonly enjoyed by humans are dangerous to dogs, including chocolate, grapes and raisins, onions, Macadamia nuts, and hops. Dogs also may find some poisons attractive, including antifreeze and snail bait.

Reproduction

Among professional breeders, dogs are only allowed to mate for a specific purpose. Sometimes dogs are bred to create puppies to sell, or sometimes to carry on an award-winning purebred line. Breeders who do this are usually experienced in this process. Dog breeders have access to records which allow them to accurately guess which characteristics will "breed true" in a particular dog. Dog breeders also have accurate information on the complexities of the reproductive process for the breed of dog that they are accustomed to handling. Dog owners may accidently allow their pets to breed without regard to bloodlines.

Fertility

As with most domesticated species, one of the first and strongest effects seen from selective breeding is selection for cooperation with the breeding process as directed by humans. In domestic dogs, one of the behaviours that is noted is the abolition of the pair bond seen in wild canines. The ability of female domestic dog to come into estrus at any time of the year and usually twice a year is also valued. The amount of time between cycles varies greatly among different dogs, but a particular dog's cycle tends to be consistent through her life. This also called in season or in heat. Conversely, undomesticated canine species experience estrus once a year, typically in late winter.

Menarche

Most bitches come into season for the first time between 6 and 12 months, although some larger breeds delay until as late as 2 years. Like most mammals, the age that a bitch first comes into season is mostly a function of her current body weight as a proportion of her body weight when fully mature. The different rates of maturation are responsible for the menarche, not the chronological age.

Pregnancy and litters

menarche A general rule of thumb is that a mammal will produce half as many offspring as the number of teats on the mother. This rule is altered in domesticated animals since larger litters are often favoured for economic reasons. Dogs bear their litters roughly 9 weeks after fertilization. An average litter consists of about six puppies, though this number may vary wildly based on the breed of dog. Since a mother can only provide nutrients and care to a limited number of offspring, humans must assist in the care and feeding when the litter exceeds approximately eight puppies. Some breeds have been developed to emphasize certain physical traits beyond the point at which they can safely bear litters on their own. For example, the Bulldog often requires artificial insemination and almost always requires cesarean section for giving birth.

Spaying and neutering

Dog experts advise that dogs not intended for further breeding should be spayed or neutered so that they do not have undesired puppies. Unwanted puppies are abandoned, eaten, or sometimes disposed of in an inhumane fashion. It is also common for adult stray dogs who are placed in animal shelters to be euthanized due to lack of space and resources. Spaying and neutering can also help prevent hormone-driven diseases such as breast cancer and prostate cancer, as well as undesired hormone-driven behaviors. Contrary to myth, it is not required for a female dog to either experience a heat cycle or have puppies before spaying, and likewise, a male dog does not need the experience of mating before neutering; these myths are responsible for numerous unnecessary health problems and unwanted puppies. It should also be noted that a female dog may become pregnant prior to her first cycle and should be kept away from other male dogs, including littermates over the age of 4 months. Many veterinarians recommend that owners neuter/spay their pets around the age of 5 months.

Attributes

neutered Modern dog breeds show more variation in size, appearance, and behavior than any other domestic animal. Within the range of extremes, dogs generally share attributes with their wild ancestors, the wolves. Dogs are predators and scavengers, possessing sharp teeth and strong jaws for attacking, holding, and tearing their food.

Sight

Dogs were thought to be dichromats and thus, by human standards, color blind.^{1, 2} New research is now being explored that suggests that dogs may actually see some colour, but not to the extent that humans do. Because the lenses of dogs' eyes are flatter than humans', they cannot see as much detail; on the other hand, their eyes are more sensitive to light and motion than humans' eyes. Some breeds, particularly the best sighthounds, have a field of vision up to 270° (compared to 100° to 120° for humans), although broad-headed breeds with their eyes set forward have a much narrower field of vision, as low as 180°.^{1, 2}

Hearing

Dogs detect sounds as low as the 20 to 70 Hz frequency range (compared to 16 to 20 Hz for humans) and as high as 70,000 to 100,000 Hz (compared to 20,000 Hz for humans)², and in addition have a degree of ear mobility that helps them to rapidly pinpoint the exact location of a sound. They can identify a sound's location much faster than can a human, and they can hear sounds up to four times the distance that humans can.

Scenting

Dogs have nearly 220 million smell-sensitive cells over an area about the size of a pocket handkerchief (compared to 5 million over an area the size of a postage stamp for humans). Some breeds have been selectively bred for excellence in detecting scents, even compared to their canine brethren. Other than the oversimplified obvious, i.e. chemical compounds that affect chemical sensors in the nose, what a dog actually detects when he is scenting is not really understood; although once a matter of debate, it now seems to be well established that dogs can distinguish two different types of scents when trailing, an air scent from some person or thing that has recently passed by, as well as a ground scent that remains detectable for a much longer period. The characteristics and behavior of these two types of scent trail would seem, after some thought, to be quite different, the air scent being intermittent but perhaps less obscured by competing scents, whereas the ground scent would be relatively permanent with respect to careful and repetitive search by the dog, but would seem to be much more contaminated with other scents. In any event, it is established by those who train tracking dogs that it is impossible to teach the dog how to track any better than it does naturally; the object instead is to motivate it properly, and teach it to maintain focus on a single track and ignore any others that might otherwise seem of greater interest to an untrained dog. An intensive search for a scent, for instance searching a ship for contraband, can actually be very fatiguing for a dog, and the dog must be motivated to continue this hard work for a long period of time.

Direction and spatial sense

It has been observed that a lost dog can often find its way home, sometimes traveling over long distances.

Weather detection

Dogs also have the ability to sense inclement weather (mainly thunderstorms) many miles away. This is due to their keen ability to detect fluctuations in barometric pressure and can explain a dog's anxiety before and during a storm. The evolutionary ability of sensing weather can be traced back to when wolves used it to move the pack into proper shelter before a dangerous storm.

Diseases and ailments

Dogs are susceptible to various diseases, ailments, and poisons, some of which affect humans in the same way, others of which are unique to dogs. For additional information on these and other related topics, see dog health and :Category:Dog health.

Diseases

Diseases commonly associated with dogs include rabies (hydrophobia), canine parvovirus, and canine distemper, although there are many others.

Parasites

Common external parasites are various species of fleas, ticks, and mites. Internal parasites include hookworms, tapeworms, roundworms, and heartworms.

Common Physical Disorders

Some breeds of dogs are also prone to certain genetic ailments, such as hip dysplasia, luxating patellas, cleft palate, blindness, or deafness. Dogs are also susceptible to the same ailments that humans are, including diabetes, epilepsy, cancer, and arthritis. Gastric torsion and bloat is a dangerous problem in some large-chested breeds.

Behaviour

bloat All dogs have a tremendous capacity to learn complex social behavior and to interpret varied body language and sounds, and, like many predators, can react to and learn from novel situations. The requirements of coordinating complex social behavior requires that canines have the ability to sense and deliver a wide variety of cues via body language, more so than for even humans, who can use language for the same purpose. Physiologically, this correlates with such features as a large number of nerves innervating the facial muscles of dogs, allowing subtle control of a wide variety of facial expressions; in contrast to cats, for instance, who have many fewer nerves governing their facial muscles, resulting in a smaller repertoire or "vocabulary" of expressions. This ability to read and deliver nonverbal cues makes dogs expert at reading human beings, as well, often even more so than other humans are, who rely on language. Most dog owners have a large collection of stories about their dogs recognizing individuals by their footsteps outside the door, and so on.

Interactions between Dogs and Humans

:Main article: Dog society The relationship between dogs and humans is rooted in history and dogs coexist with humans in a variety of ways. Dogs thrive in small social groups or packs which, from their viewpoint, can include humans. Dog society can be thought of as dog packs characterized by a companionate hierarchy, in which each individual has a rank, and in which there is intense loyalty within the group. Dogs thrive in human society because their relationships with humans mimic their natural social patterns. The dog is always aware of its rank relative to other individuals in the group. An assertive dog may consider itself the alpha animal, considering its human master to be subordinate.

Treats

Many dogs consider anything given to them directly by hand to be a treat, even the food they are accustomed to at meal time. Special dog treats are not necessary for such animals. Care should also be taken to avoid dropping small but inedible objects (such as marbles, coins, rings, etc.) around such dogs. Some food considered as treats for humans, such as chocolate and raisins, are poisonous to dogs. If a dog has something valuable (rings, money, irreplaceable items), a treat should be used to "barter" with the dog to retrieve the stolen item. Chasing a dog will encourage play behavior, which may cause the item to be swallowed or destroyed.

Dogs as working partners

Many breeds of dogs, but not least German Shepherd, Labrador Retriever, and Border Collie are commonly used as working dogs. There are service dogs, guard dogs, hunting dogs, and herding dogs. Dogs have served as guides for the blind, as commandos, and have flown into outer space (see Laika and other Russian space dogs). Most modern working dogs are put in positions which capitalize on their sensory or strength and endurance advantages over normal humans. Dogs are also used for searching for or rescuing people and animals, such as in avalanches, at disaster sites, and for missing people or pets.

Dogs as hunting and sporting partners

Many people compete with their dogs in a variety of dog sports, including agility, flyball, and many others. This often strengthens the bond between human and dog, since they must trust one another in a variety of environments and must learn how the other works and thinks. Setters in particular have a long history as upland gun dogs. They have a native ability to discover and "hold" upland game birds; to freeze them momentarily on the ground with their silent, elongated pointing stance. Once the hunter approaches, at his command they will flush the birds to fly and for the hunter to shoot at. As water dogs, the retrievers are unsurpassed. They can spend long hours in a duck blind and, after the hunter has fired at multiple ducks or geese, they can visually spot and remember the location of downed birds. At command, they dive into the icy water, swim out and retrieve the birds one by one. They can follow hand, verbal, and whistle commands at great distance as the hunter directs them to the downed bird. They typically have large, gentle muzzles to mitigate any potential damage to the game. When trained, beagles are particularly adept at chasing through thick briars and brush after rabbits. Many hound breeds are excellent at treeing raccoons during hunting season. Hunters with dogs report the satisfaction that the dogs seem to exhibit. Excitement is evident as they see the hunters load weapons, take to the field, and begin the hunt.

Dogs as pets

hound make the best pets]] Relationships between humans and dogs are often characterized by strong emotional bonds. Consequently, dogs are popular as pets and companions, independent of any utilitarian considerations. Many dog owners consider having unconditional acceptance from a friend who is always happy to see them to be quite utilitarian, particularly if the dog also leads them to regular exercise. Empirically, dogs are quite dependent on human companionship and may suffer poor health in its absence. Many dogs are reported to have separation anxiety if its owner is away for an extended period of time. Some research demonstrates that dogs are able to convey a depth of emotion not seen to the same extent in any other animal; this is purportedly due to their closely-knit development with modern man, and the survival-benefits of such communication as dogs became more dependent on humans for sustenance. Nevertheless, it is often unwise to anthropomorphize the responses of dogs. Despite understandably positive interpretations by dog owners, it is questionable whether these animals are truly capable of feeling emotions on a human level. More research is needed to determine the intelligence level of dogs, and the motivations behind their responses to their masters.

Dogs as food

:Main article: Taboo food and drink In some countries, certain breeds of dogs are raised for their meat. Often times, this causes friction with societies that want a complete ban on consumption of dog meat. In times of great stress, such as when the Vikings of Greenland starved to death at the start of the Little Ice Age (14th century - 19th century), humans have been known to eat their pets. In some small Chinese provincial towns, there is a special breed of dog (called "Black Dogs" in Chinese language) mainly used for cuisine. However, almost any breed of dog is eaten all over China. Although some Western dog lovers may claim that dog is regarded as a "lower source of food," many Asians, in actuality, regard it as a luxury food, costing much more than other types of meat. The people of Korea have been known to eat certain breeds of dogs as well. This led to issues during the 2002 Football World Cup when South Korea was hosting the game with the local government keen to obscure this practice from visiting countries.

Attacks on humans and livestock

Humans have a tendency to anthropomorphize animals, particularly pets such as dogs, which are generally portrayed as being "man's best friend". Animals are often given attributes such as "loyal", "cute", and "guardian", but these all have the potential to lure people into a false sense of security. After thousands of years of domestication and selective breeding for dogs who do not show aggression towards humans, most dogs are unlikely to attack people. However, their sharp teeth and claws can inflict injury in an attack; a large dog can knock a human down. Provocation can range from something as seemingly innocuous as a toddler pulling a dog's tail, in which case the dog might nip to discourage the behavior, to something completely transparent to humans, such as an odor or a movement that sets a dog off, to blatant human aggression or violence towards a dog, causing it to defend itself. There are hundreds of shades of provocation that may or may not lead to an attack upon a human. Canine aggression upon humans is ordinarily not tolerated. With formidable skills and weapons as hunters as well as large and unfussy appetites, dogs often menace livestock and wildlife. In most jurisdictions, dogs are destroyed for killing other creatures, so dogs should be prevented from any encounter with livestock or wildlife that might lead to a predatory response. The same creatures that wolves, coyotes, and foxes attack as prey, especially sheep and poultry, are similarly attractive prey to dogs. For more information about attack provocations and attack behavior, see dog attacks.

Abandoned Dogs

Wild dogs are shot by farmers in an effort to protect livestock. Bodies are sometimes tied to fences as warning to other dogs, especially in rural United States and Canada. Abandoned domestic dogs who become feral are particularly dangerous; they lack the survival skills of wild canines, as well as the genetic and learned fear of the humans' world. Feral dogs often form predatory packs that attack livestock and occasionally also prove dangerous to humans.

Ancestry and history of domestication

feral Molecular systematics indicate that the domestic dog is descended from a wolf-like ancestor. As reflected in the nomenclature, dogs are a subspecies of wolf and are thus still able to interbreed. The relationship between man and canine is a long-standing tradition. Wolf remains have been found in association with hominid remains dating from 400,000 years ago. Dogs were, and are, valued for their aid in hunting. Dog burials at the Mesolithic cemetery of Svaerdborg in Denmark indicate that in ancient Europe dogs were valued companions. The molecular genetic data suggests that the domestic lineage separated from modern wolves around 150,000 years ago (Vilà et al, 1997). Conservative estimates propose that the domestication of the dog probably occurred at least 14,000 years ago. There is archaeological evidence of dog remains that are morphologically different from wolves from that time frame. However, in the early 2000s [http://www.amonline.net.au/archive.cfm?id=716 some research] indicated that domestication in fact had already begun to occur as early as 100,000 years ago.

Wolf ancestors

Some evidence suggests that several varieties of ancient wolves contributed genetically to the domestic dog. These contributions may have been deliberate or unintentional interbreeding. This means that various traits from one or more of the ancestral wolf lines were preserved in the domestic dog. Although all wolves belong to the species Canis lupus, there are (or were) many subspecies that had developed a distinctive appearance, social structure, and other traits. For example, the Japanese wolf and the Eastern Timber Wolf posses different distinctive colouration, hunting and social structures. The Indian Wolf is thought to have contributed to the development of more breeds of dogs than other subspecies. Many of today's wild dogs, such as the dingo, the dhole and pariah dogs, are descended from this wolf. Domestic dogs like sight hounds are also thought to have descended from this wolf according to [http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ss/stories/s728909.htm recent genetic evidence]. This hypothesis that modern dog breeds originated from Asia contradicts an earlier theory that dogs had evolved in Africa, much like humans. The Indian wolf is also thought to have bred with descendants of the European wolf to create the Mastiffs and eventually leading to the development of such diverse breeds as the Pug, the Saint Bernard, and the Bloodhound. The Tibetan Mastiff is an example of an ancient breed. The European wolf, in turn, may have contributed many of its attributes to the Spitz dog types, most terriers, and many of today's sheepdogs. The Chinese wolf is probably ancestor to the Pekingese and toy spaniels, although it is also probable that descendants of the Chinese and European wolves encountered each other over the millennia, contributing to many of the oriental toy breeds. The Eastern Timber Wolf is a direct ancestor to most, if not all, of the North American northern sled dog types. This interbreeding still occurs with dogs living in the Arctic region, where the attributes of the wolf that enable survival in a hostile environment are valued by humans. Additionally, unintentional crossbreeding occurs simply because dogs and wolves live in the same environment. The general reproductive isolation which is required to define dogs and wolves as separate species is purely a result of lack of opportunity, stemming from a general mutual unfamiliarity, suspicion, mistrust, and fear. The phenotypic characteristic that define a wolf from a dog are tenuous. Wolves typically have a "brush tail" and erect ears. While some dog breeds possess one of these characteristics, they rarely possess both.

Speed of domestication

Current research indicates that domestication, or the attributes of a domesticated animal, [http://www.amsci.org/amsci/articles/99articles/Trut.html#26879 can occur much more quickly] than previously believed. Domestication of a wild dog may occur within one or two human generations with deliberate selective breeding. It is also now generally believed that initial domestication was not attained solely by human desire intervention but through mutual desire. Wild canines who scavenged around human habitations received more food than their more skittish or fearful counterparts. Canines who attacked people or their children were likely killed or driven away, while those more friendly animals survived. Canines would have been beneficial by chasing away other vermin or scavengers. The relationship is theorized to have developed in this way.

Dog breeds

There are numerous dog breeds, over 800 being recognized by various kennel clubs worldwide. As all dog breeds have been derived from mixed-breed dog populations, the term "purebred" has meaning only with respect to a certain number of generations. Many dogs, especially outside the United States and Western Europe, belong to no recognized breed. A few basic breed types have evolved gradually during the domesticated dog's relationship with man over the last 10,000 or more years, but most modern breeds are of relatively recent derivation. Many of these are the product of a deliberate process of artificial selection. Because of this, some breeds are highly specialized, and there is extraordinary morphological diversity across different breeds. Despite these differences, dogs are able to distinguish dogs from other kinds of animal. The definition of a dog breed is a matter of some controversy. Some groups use a definition that ultimately requires extreme inbreeding to qualify due to the low gene pool. Dogs that are bred in this manner often end up with severe health or behavioural problems. Other organizations define a breed more loosely, such that an individual may be considered of one breed as long as 75% of its parentage is of that breed. These considerations come into play among breeders who enter their dogs in dog shows. Even prize-winning purebred dogs sometimes possess crippling genetic defects due to inbreeding. These problems are not limited to purebred dogs and can affect mixed-breed populations. The behavior and appearance of a dog of a particular breed can be predicted fairly accurately, while mixed-breed dogs show a broader range of innovative appearance and behavior. In February 2004, the Canine Studies Institute in Aurora, Ohio, arranged recognized breeds of dogs into ten categories. Mixed-breed dogs or Mongrels are dogs that do not belong to specific breeds, being mixtures of two or more in variant percentages. Mixed breeds, or dogs with no purebred ancestry, are not inherently "better" or "worse" than purebred dogs as companions, pets, working dogs, or competitors in dog sports. Sometimes mixed-breed dogs are deliberately bred, for example, the Cockapoo, a mixture of Cocker Spaniel and Miniature Poodle. Such deliberate crosses may display hybrid vigor and other desirable traits, but can also lack one or more of the desired traits of their parents, such as temperament or a particular color or coat. However, without genetic testing of the parents, the crosses can sometimes end up inheriting genetic defects that occur in both parental breeds. Deliberately crossing two or more breeds is also a manner of establishing new breeds.

Neoteny in the rapid evolution of diverse dog breeds

This rapid evolution of dogs from wolves is an example of neoteny or paedomorphism. As with many species, the young wolves are more social and less dominant than adults; therefore, the selection for these characteristics, whether deliberate or inadvertent, is more likely to result in a simple retention of juvenile characteristics into adulthood than to generate a complex of independent new changes in behavior. This is true of many domesticated animals, including human beings themselves, who have many characteristics similar to young bonobo. This paedomorphic selection naturally results in a retention of juvenile physical characteristics as well. Compared to wolves, many adult dog breeds retain such juvenile characteristics as soft fuzzy fur, round torsos, large heads and eyes, ears that hang down rather than stand erect, etc.; characteristics which are shared by most juvenile mammals, and therefore generally elicit some degree of protective and nurturing behavior cross-species from most adult mammals, including humans, who term such characteristics "cute" or "appealing". The example of canine neoteny goes even further, in that the various breeds are differently neotenized according to the type of behavior that was selected.
- Breeds that guard flocks, such as the various sheepdog breeds, retain the most juvenile characteristics: they stay close to home with their foster "litter" (which might include a flock of sheep), rather than going out hunting, they have almost no predatory behavior (which would be disastrous in the vicinity of such a natural prey stimulus as sheep), they respond to perceived threats with a lot of vocalization and attempts to alert and engage the dominant individuals in their "pack" (i.e. humans) whenever possible, engaging in actual combat only as a last resort. In addition, they retain very juvenile physical characteristics such as round bodies and heads, soft coats, ears that hang down, and so on, which do not elicit fear responses from the sheep in the way that an appearance similar to that of an adult wolf would. (Compare to the physical appearance of the border collie, a sheep herding dog, whose physical configuration is closer to that of an adult wild canine and who therefore has a greater capacity to frighten sheep into a desired pattern of movement, along with the more adult aggressive temperament to do so).
- Breeds that are hunting dogs—that is, pointers, setters, spaniels, retrievers, etc.—have an intermediate degree of paedomorphism; they are at the point where they share in the pack's hunting behavior, but are still in a junior role, not participating in the actual attack. They identify potential prey and freeze into immobility, for instance, but refrain from then stalking the prey as an adult predator would do next; this results in the "pointing" behavior for which such dogs are bred. Similarly, they seize dead or wounded prey and bring it back to the "pack", even though they did not attack it themselves, that is, "retrieving" behavior. Their physical characteristics are closer to that of the mature wild canine than the sheepdog breeds, but they typically do not have erect ears, etc.
- Scenthounds maintain an intermediate body type and behavior pattern that causes them to actually pursue prey by tracking their scent, but tend to refrain from actual individual attacks in favor of vocally summoning the pack leaders (in this case, humans) to do the job. This contrasts with sighthounds, who pursue and attack perceived prey on sight, and who maintain the mature canine body type with erect ears, lean bodies, and adult coats.
- Terriers similarly have adult aggressive behavior, famously coupled with a lack of juvenile submission, and display correspondingly adult physical features such as erect ears, although many breeds have also been selected for size and sometimes dwarfed legs to enable them to pursue prey in their burrows.
- The least paedomorphic behavior pattern may be that of the basenji, bred in Africa to hunt alongside humans almost on a peer basis; this breed is often described as highly independent, neither needing nor appreciating a great deal of human attention or nurturing, often described as "catlike" in its behavior. It too has the body plan of an adult canine predator. Of course, dogs in general possess a significant ability to modify their behavior according to experience, including adapting to the behavior of their "pack leaders"—again, humans. This allows them to be trained to behave in a way that is not specifically the most natural to their breed; nevertheless, the accumulated experience of thousands of years shows that some combinations of nature and nurture are quite daunting, for instance, training whippets to guard flocks of sheep.

References and further reading

References

- Kennel Club Books [http://www.kennelclubbooks.com Website] 400 titles on dogs.
- Abrantes, Roger (1999). Dogs Home Alone. Wakan Tanka, 46 pages. ISBN 0966048423 (paperback).
- ¹A&E Television Networks (1998). Big Dogs, Little Dogs: The companion volume to the A&E special presentation, A Lookout Book, GT Publishing. ISBN 1-57719-353-9 (hardcover).
- ²Alderton, David (1984). The Dog, Chartwell Books. ISBN 0-89009-786-0.
- Brewer, Douglas J. (2002) Dogs in Antiquity: Anubis to Cerberus: The Origins of the Domestic Dog, Aris & Phillips ISBN 0856687049
- Donaldson, Jean (1997). The Culture Clash. James & Kenneth Publishers. ISBN 1888047054 (paperback).
- Fogle, Bruce DVM The New Encyclopedia of the Dog, 2000
- Milani, Myrna M. (1986). The Body Language and Emotion of Dogs: A practical guide to the Physical and Behavioral Displays Owners and Dogs Exchange and How to Use Them to Create a Lasting Bond, William Morrow, 283 pages. ISBN 0688128416 (trade paperback).
- Pfaffenberger, Clare (1971). New Knowledge of Dog Behavior. Wiley, ISBN 0876057040 (hardcover); Dogwise Publications, 2001, 208 pages, ISBN 1929242042 (paperback).
- Shook, Larry (1995). "Breeders Can Hazardous to Health",The Puppy Report: How to Select a Healthy, Happy Dog, Chapter Two, pp. 13–34. Ballantine, 130 pages, ISBN 0345384393 (mass market paperback); Globe Pequot, 1992, ISBN 1558211403 (hardcover; this is much cheaper should you buy).
- Shook, Larry (1995). The Puppy Report: How to Select a Healthy, Happy Dog, Chapter Four, "Hereditary Problems in Purebred Dogs", pp. 57–72. Ballantine, 130 pages, ISBN 0345384393 (mass market paperback); Globe Pequot, 1992, ISBN 1558211403 (hardcover; this is much cheaper should you buy).
- Thomas, Elizabeth Marshall (1993). The Hidden Life of Dogs (hardcover), A Peter Davison Book, Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 0395669588.
- Vilà, Caries; Savolainen, Peter; Maldonado, Jesus E.; Amorim, Isabel R.; Rice, John E.; Honeycutt, Rodney L.; Crandall, Keith A.; Lundeberg, Joakim; Wayne, Robert K. (1997). [http://www.mnh.si.edu/GeneticsLab/StaffPage/MaldonadoJ/PublicationsCV/Science_Dog_Paper.pdf Multiple and ancient origins of the domestic dog.] Science 276, pp. 1687–1689.

External links

;General info
- [http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/02/0209_040209_dogsdogsdogs.html National Geographic News] Many articles and photos about dogs ;Genetics and origins
- Lindblad-Toh, K., et. al. [http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7069/abs/nature04338.html "Genome sequence, comparative analysis, and haplotype structure of the domestic dog"] Nature 438:803-819, December 2005.
- [http://www.idir.net/~wolf2dog/wayne1.htm "Multiple and Ancient Origins of the Domestic Dog"]
- [http://www.fiu.edu/~milesk/Genetics.htm Canid Genetics]
- [http://www.nhgri.nih.gov/11008069 "Dog Genome Sequencing"] - NHGRI
- [http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_713600.html "World's dogs are descended from Asian wolves"]
- [http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2002/01/01/html/ft_20020101.1.html#know "From Wolf to Woof - The Evolution of Dogs"] ;Training and behavior
- [http://www.uwsp.edu/psych/dog/dog.htm Noncommercial site sponsored by the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point]
- [http://www.greatcanine.com/ Puppy Training Information] ;Breed listings from major kennel clubs
- [http://www.akc.org/ American Kennel Club]
- [http://www.ckc.ca/ Canadian Kennel Club]
- [http://www.ukcdogs.com/breeds/ United Kennel Club] Breed lists for many breeds and types not recognized by the AKC--and for many that are (U.S.)
- [http://www.fci.be FCI]Fédération Cynologique Internationale - FCI
- [http://www.dogdomain.com/fci-1.htm FCI] International breed standards
- [http://www.ankc.aust.com/breed_list.html Australian National Kennel Club]
- [http://www.the-kennel-club.org.uk The Kennel Club (UK)]
- [http://www.nzkc.org.nz/dogselect.html New Zealand Kennel Club] Category:Animals kept as pets Category:Canines ko:개 ja:イヌ simple:Dog th:สุนัข

1970s

The 1970s in its most obvious sense refers to the decade between 1970 and 1979. The decade is remembered by many as the 1960s rapidly running out of steam, and the gloom of recession replacing the optimism of the 1960s Flower Power era. The United States, which had become an influential global power, experienced much of the transition. While the sixties saw social activism, society became more self-absorbed in the seventies. Analyst and writer Tom Wolfe epitomized this feeling in 1976, calling the seventies the "Me Decade." Music became at once more introspective with the singer-songwriter movement and more carefree with the rise of disco music. As the decade continued on, the American world view became apprehensive, with continuing inner-city poverty and rising urban crime rates, the Watergate hearings broadcast on television, and the Vietnam War still fresh in the national memory. Network, arguably one of the decade's most representative films, dealt with narcissism and paranoia as violence escalated in the Middle East and America was crippled by the Oil Shock of 1973. As the economy slipped, the use of recreational drugs increased and many began to fear purported cults such as the Children of God. By the end of the decade the feminist movement had helped improve women's working conditions and environmentalism had become a major cause in the United States and Europe. While the United States experienced recession, the economy of Japan rose to claim the top spot on the world stage. The economies of many third world countries continued to bloom in the early 1970s through the green revolution. They might have thrived and become stable in the way that Europe recovered after the war through the Marshall Plan; however, the economic growth was stunted by the oil crisis. In 1973, foreign peacekeepers fled Vietnam, and the war that had lasted for nearly a decade ended with the Paris Peace Accords and communism continuing to spread. In neighboring Cambodia, several million citizens were executed by communist leader Pol Pot. Meanwhile, black South Africans still remained under apartheid following the death of activist Steve Biko.

Worldwide trends in the Seventies

The ethos of the 1970s emerged from a transition of the global social structure. It reflected the transition from the decline of colonial imperialism since the end of World War II to globalization and the rise of a new middle class in the developing world. Globally, the 1970s had several features that were similar and definitive across economic levels and regions. These aspects and essence that make up global essence of the 1970s are the defining points of the 1970s: the Bretton Woods system and its subsequent failure, the impact of the contraceptive pill on social-interactional dynamics, and the oil shock of 1973. The developing nations experienced economic growth that came in the wake of political independence. However, several African economies declined and political states became dictatorial regimes. Many Middle Eastern democracies crumbled into chaotic regimes with pseudo democratic governments. The 1970s ethos in much of the developing world was characterized by:
- the incessant need to redefine social norms to newer socioeconomic systems,
- the sheer pace at which they need to adapt to new social influences along with the need to integrate it to their native cultural context, and
- the constant aspiration for a more egalitarian society in cultures that were long colonised and have an even longer history of hierarchical social structure. The green revolution of the late 1960s brought about self sufficiency in many developing economies. At the same time an increasing number of people began to seek urban prosperity over agrarian life. This consequently saw the duality of transition of diverse interaction across social communities amid increasing information blockade across social class. Other common global ethos of the seventies world include: increasingly flexible and varied gender roles for women. Women could now enter the work force and not just be housewives. However the gender role of men remained as that of a bread-winner. The period also saw unprecedented socioeconomic impact of an ever-increasing number of women entering the non-agrarian economic workforce, and the sweeping cultural-religious impact of the Iranian revolution toward the end of the 1970s. The global experience of the cultural transition of the 1970s and an experience of a global zeitgeist revealed the interdependence of economies since World War II, and showed the huge impact of American economic policies on the world.

Economy of the Seventies

The developed economies of the world, the 1970s adversely distinguished itself from the prosperous postwar period between 1945 and 1969. Then, the world economy was buoyed by the Marshall Plan and the robust American economy. However, the high standing enjoyed by the American economy gradually became discomposed by loose domestic and war spending, particularly the Vietnam war. The oil shock of 1973 added to the existing ailments and conjured high inflation throughout much of the world for the rest of the decade. World leaders, such as James Callaghan of the United Kingdom, and Jimmy Carter of the United States, could not control it, causing their support to dwindle. Although there was no economic depression, the period is known for "stagflation", in which inflation and unemployment steadily increased, therefore leading to lower economic growth rates than previous decades. In Eastern Europe, Soviet-style command economies began showing signs of stagnation, in which successes were persistently dogged by setbacks. The oil shock increased East European, particularly Soviet, exports, but agriculture became a growing annoyance to such economies.

Oil crisis

Jimmy Carter, were common throughout the Western world. Also common were long lines to receive rationed petrol products.]] Economically, the seventies were marked by the energy crisis which peaked in 1973 and 1979 (see 1973 oil crisis and 1979 oil crisis). After the first oil shock in 1973, gasoline was rationed in many countries. Europe particularly depended on the Middle East for oil; the US was also affected even though it had its own oil reserves. Many European countries introduced car-free days. In the US, customers with a license plate ending in an odd number were only allowed to buy gasoline on odd-numbered days, while even-numbered plate-holders could only purchase gasoline on even-numbered days. The experience that oil reserves were not endless and technological development was not sustainable without harming the environment ended the age of modernism. As a result, ecological awareness rose.

Social movements

Environmentalism

The seventies touched off a mainstream affirmation of the environmental issues early activists from the '60s, such as Rachel Carson, warned about. The moon landing that had occurred at the end of the previous decade transmitted back concrete images of the earth as an integrated, life-supporting system and shaped a public willingness to preserve nature. On April 22, 1970, the United States celebrated its first Earth Day in which over two thousand colleges and universities and roughly ten thousand primary and secondary schools participated. Over the course of the decade, in the US a series of environmentally friendly legislation would be passed. Notable actions included the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970, the passage of Clean Water Act in 1972, and the enactment of the Endangered Species Act the next year. The takeoff of environmental thought rose parallel to the increased usage of nuclear power over fossil fuels. However, with the increasing expenses of nuclear power the opposition likewise grew. [http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/articles/180] Opposition to nuclear power became widespread in reaction to the partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant on March 28, 1979.

Feminism

Feminism in the United States got its start in the 1960s, but began to take flight starting in 1970, with the fiftieth anniversary of the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (which legalized female suffrage). With the anthology Sisterhood is Powerful and other works being published at the start of the decade, feminism started to reach a larger audience.

Gay rights

The Stonewall riots, which occurred in New York City in June 1969, are generally considered to have ignited the modern gay rights movement, especially in North America (the U.K. had already decriminalised homosexuality in 1967). In the 1970s, in western countries and especially so in major urban centers, gay and lesbian people came out of the closet as never before (even as many others remained closeted) and a vocal and visible gay-rights movement coalesced in an unprecedented way. Considering the profound stigma attached to homosexuality at the dawn of the 1970s, the movement, although still nascent, saw tremendous gains over the course of the decade. The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of psychiatric disorders in 1973. Gay-rights ordinances were passed by several cities (beginning with Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1972), and, for the first time, a few openly gay people were elected to political office in the United States. In 1977 Harvey Milk, a politically active gay man in the emerging gay neighborhood The Castro, was elected to the Board of Supervisors in San Francisco. Milk and liberal San Francisco mayor George Moscone were assassinated the following year; in 1979 their assassin, Dan White, received a sentence of voluntary manslaughter. The anger the gay community felt about the murders and about White's light sentence further galvanized the movement. The increasing visibility of gay people also generated a backlash during the seventies. In perhaps the most discussed anti-gay rights campaign of the decade, singer Anita Bryant led a successful drive in 1977 to repeal a gay-rights ordinance in Dade County, Florida. The new openness about homosexuality proved disconcerting to some heterosexuals who had been accustomed to gay and lesbian people remaining closeted and politically silent. "The love that dare not speak its name," Canadian author Robertson Davies wrote during the decade, referencing the famous Lord Alfred Douglas quote, "has become the love that won't shut up." On October 14, 1979, approximately 100,000 people marched in Washington, D.C., in the largest pro-gay rights demonstration up to that time.

Culture during the Seventies

Emerging social perspectives in the Seventies

In the wake of the 1960s many of the social dimenisions and perspectives towards issues were increasingly seen in liberal perspectives. Universities became more friendly and less authoritative towards students. This was reflected in the corporate culture of the 1970s, where the hierarchy between supervisor and subordinates became increasingly flat. This had influence in social interaction and family relationship as well. The nuclear family rose to prominence in the third world and the role of women in nuclear families took radical shift from those of earlier generations. With the rise of nuclear family and liberal attitudes towards social structure came new perspectives to child rearing and education. The 70s saw a decline in attendance to boarding schools and a rise of local day schools. The role of the nuclear family and the parent was increasingly noticed and given new impetus. Social norms and laws were increasingly framed in favour of women.

The Seventies in music

The seventies were a time when a new generation of young people were exposed to new media and hence newer ideas in almost every field. Elvis was probably the biggest entertainer in the world in the 70´s and in 1973 he held the historic Hawaain concert which was televised worldwide to almost 1.5 billion people from over 40 countries. TV and motion picture brought to varied audiences images, lifestyles and music from diverse regions and peoples. This led to the emergence of a new vocabulary and experimentation in music. After the war the second generation of German musicians began experimenting with music, these included experimental classical music and the tradition of Krautrock or Kraut music, rooted in the experimental classical music. This later influenced both art rock and progressive rock. The main exponents of this genre include Genesis, Yes, Emerson, Lake & Palmer and space rock giants Pink Floyd. The experimental nature of progressive rock is exemplified in songs such as Pink Floyd's Echoes. The seventies is also when many legendary rock bands started, or hit their peak, including The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith, AC/DC,Queen (Band),Black Sabbath]], KISS, The Who, and Van Halen. Another experimentation in European classical music was brought about by composer Philip Glass and Michael Nyman, with what was to be called Minimalist music. This was a break from the intellectual serial music of the tradition of Schoenberg which lasted from the early 1900s to 1960s. Minimalist music sought to appreciate simple music with systematic patterns repeated in complex variations. These experimentations were also used in several movies made in the early 1970s. In world music the musical collaboration of violinists Yehudi Menuhin and L. Subramaniam was appreciated by a large audience. The commercial cinemas around the world tended to imitate nuances of disco beats in their movies to present their movies as western and upbeat. These included the increasingly popular Kung-fu movies in far East Asia and Bollywood movies from India. One of the most successful European groups of the decade was the quartet ABBA. The Swedish group, who are still the most successful group from their country, first found fame when they won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest. They became one of the most widely known European groups ever, and were the decade's biggest sellers. "Waterloo" and "Dancing Queen" are two of ABBA's most popular songs. To many people, the Seventies will be most remembered for the rise in disco music. First creeping into dance clubs in the mid-seventies (with such hits as "The Hustle" by Van McCoy), songstresses like Donna Summer, Gloria Gaynor, Dalida and Anita Ward popularized the genre and were described in subsequent decades as the "disco divas." The Village People scored a Top Ten hit with "Y.M.C.A." and the Bee Gees had a string of #1s following their collaboration on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. As quickly as disco's popularity came, however, it fell out of favor with the new decade, and effectively died in 1981, with the popularity of New Wave bands such as Blondie and Devo, who both formed their respective bands in the seventies. Many of the aforementioned singers who became popular during the disco era found themselves out of tune with the 1980s, and were out of work for many years, until a renewed interest in disco brought many of them back to the forefront. Many songs from the disco era are still very popular dance hits and receive continuous airplay in nightclubs throughout the world. The mid-seventies saw the rise of punk music from its protopunk/garage band roots in the 1960s and early 1970s. The Ramones, the Sex Pistols, and The Clash were some of the earliest acts to make it big in both the United Kingdom and the United States. Groups like the Clash were noted for the experimentation of style, especially that of having strong reggae influences in their music. Punk music has also been heavily associated with a certain punk fashion and absurdist humor which exemplified a genuine suspicion of mainstream culture and values.

The Seventies in cinema

World cinema

In cinema all over the world, the seventies brought about vigour in adventurous and realistic complex narratives with rich cinematography and elaborate scores. The cultural interaction between aided with TV and visual media and the rise in motion picture technology ushered in a new period of motion picture making. In European cinema, the failure of the Prague Spring brought about nostalgic motion pictures reminiscent of the ones that celebrate the 1970s itself. These movies expressed a yearning and as a premonition to the decade and its dreams. The Hungarian director István Szabó made the motion picture Szerelmesfilm (1970), which is a nostalgic portrayal and a premonition of the fading of the young 1970s ethos of change and a friendlier social structure. The Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci made the motion picture The Conformist (1970). German movies after the war aksed existential questions especially the works of Rainer Fassbinder. The movies of the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman reached a new level of expression in motion pictures like Cries and Whispers (1973). Young German directors made movies that came to be called as the German new wave. It was the voice of a new generation that had grown up after the second world war. These included directors like Wim Wenders, Hans-Jürgen Syberberg and Werner Herzog. Wim wenders made movies that explored psychological states of humans in situations intimate and significant to the characters. He made Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter (The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty Kick) in 1972. It was based on a novella by Peter Handke. He further explored this realm in the motion picture Alice in den Städten (Alice in the Cities), 1974. Hans-Jürgen Syberberg created a sensation in 1977 with the motion picture Hitler: ein Film aus Deutschland (Hitler a film from Germany). It was a seven hour movie which attempted to investigate hitler under the shadows of wagner art and Nazi nationalism. This was followed by the expressionist movie Woyzeck (1979) by Werner Herzog. Asian cinema of the 1970s catered to the rising middle class fantasies and struggles. In the Bollywood cinema of India this was epitomised by the movies of Bollywood superhero Amitabh Bachchan. These movies portrayed adventurous plots with car chase trying to imitate hollywood movies like The French Connection, presented music with Disco beats and also presented the young middle class man as an "angry young man". The women on the other hand were shown as ones who have adopted western values and outfits especially by heroines like Parveen Babi (who was featured on the cover of TIME for a story on Bollywood's success) and Zeenat Aman. However towards the very end of the 1970s, especially after the steep rise in land prices in urban areas and the decline in employment security, the heroines were seen more often as saree-women striving to have a prosperous middle class family especially heroines like Jayaprada and Hema Malini. In this way the cinema of asian region becomes a sociological statement of the social-economic times of the region and its people. Other movie industry of the region produced fine masterpieces like in Malayalam cinema. Adoor Gopalakrishnan made Swayamvaram in 1972, which got wide critical acclaim. This was followed by the movie Nirmalyam by M.T. Vasudevan Nair in 1973.
Hollywood
The decade opened with Hollywood facing a financial slump, reflecting the monetary woes of the nation as a whole during the first half of the decade. Despite this, the seventies proved to be a benchmark decade in the development of cinema, both as an art form and a business. With young filmmakers taking greater risks and restrictions regarding language and sexuality lifting, Hollywood produced some its most critically acclaimed and financially successful films since its supposed "golden era." Hollywood for his role in the 1972 hit The Godfather. He boycotted the ceremony and sent Native American Sacheen Littlefeather to reject the award on his behalf. Also pictured are Roger Moore and Liv Ullmann.]] In the years previous to 1970, Hollywood had began to cater to the younger generation with films such as The Graduate and Topless Nurses. This proved a folly when anti-war films like R.P.M. and The Strawberry Statement became major box-office flops. Even solid films with bankable stars, like the Pearl Harbor epic Tora! Tora! Tora!, flopped, leaving studios in dire straights financially. Unable to repay financiers, studios began selling off land, furniture, clothing, and sets acquired over years of production. Nostalgic fans bid on merchandise and collectables ranging from Judy Garland's sparkling red shoes to MGM's own back lots. More of the successful films were those based in the harsh truths of war, rather than the excesses of the '60s. Films like Patton, about the World War II general, and M
- A
- S
- H, about a Korean War field hospital, were major box-office draws in 1970. Honest, old-fashioned films like Five Easy Pieces, Summer of '42, and the Erich Segal adaptation, Love Story, were commercial and critical hits. (Love Story and "Summer" remain, as of 2005, two of the most successful films in Hollywood history. "Summer," costing $1,000,000 USD, brought in $25,000,000 at the box office, while "Love Story," with a budget of $2,200,000, earned $106,400,000). One of the most insightful films of the decade came from the mind of a Hollywood outsider, Czechoslovakian director Milos Forman, whose Taking Off became a bold reflection of life at the beginning of the seventies. The 1971 satirized the American middle class, following a young girl who runs away from home, leaving her parents free to explore life for the first time in years. While the film was never given a wide release in America, it became a major critical achievement both in America and around the world (garnering the film high honors at the Cannes Film Festival and several BAFTA Award nominations). An adaptation of an Arthur Hailey novel would prove to be one of the most notable films of 1970, and would set the stage for a major trend in seventies cinema. The film, Airport, featured a complex plot, characters, and an all-star cast of Hollywood A-listers and legends. Airport followed an airport manager trying to keep a fictional Chicago airport operational during a blizzard, as well as a bomb plot to blow up an airplane. The film was a major critical and financial success, helping pull Universal Studios into the black for the year. The film earned senior actress Helen Hayes an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress and garnered many other nominations in both technical and talent categories. The success of the film launched a slew of disaster-related films, many of which following the same blueprint of major stars, a melodramatic script, and great suspense. disaster Three Airport sequels followed in 1974, 1977, and 1979, each successor making less money than the last. 1972 brought The Poseidon Adventure, which starred a young Gene Hackman leading an all-star cast to safety in a capsized luxury liner. The film earned an Academy Award for visual effects (and Best Original Song for "The Morning After," as well as numerous nominations, including one for its notable supporting star, Shelley Winters. The Towering Inferno teamed Steve McQueen and Paul Newman against a fire in a New York skyscraper. The film cost a whopping $14 million to produce (expensive for its time), and won Academy Awards for Cinematography, Film Editing, and Best Original Song. The same year, the epic Earthquake featured questionable effects (camera shake and models) to achieve a destructive 9.9 earthquake in Los Angeles. Despite this, the film was one of the most successful of its time, earning $80 million at box office. By the late seventies, the novelty had worn off and the disasters had become less exciting. 1977 brought a terrorist targeting a Rollercoaster, a 1978 Swarm of bees, and a less-than-threatening Meteor in 1979. 1971 brought a rebirth of the action film, three years after the influential Bullitt. The French Connection, starring Gene Hackman, brought suspense to new heights with an adrenaline-broiling car chase through the streets of New York City, while Get Carter featured gratuitous nudity and A Clockwork Orange featured much blood and gore to complement its complex story. African American filmmakers also found success in the seventies with such hits as Shaft and Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, and more questionable films, such as Blacula and Blackenstein. Like other sequels in the seventies, Shaft went on to have two more adventures, each less successful than the last. An adaptation of a Mario Puzo novel, The Godfather, became one of the best-loved and most respected works of cinema upon its release in 1972. The three-hour epic followed a Mafia boss, played by Marlon Brando, through his life of crime. Beyond the violence and drama were themes of love, pride, and greed. The Godfather went on to earn $134 million at American box office, and $245 million throughout the world. It won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Screenplay. Its director Francis Ford Coppola was passed over in favor of Bob Fosse and his musical, Cabaret, which also earned an Oscar for its star, Liza Minnelli. The Godfather: Part II followed in 1974, with roughly the same principal cast and crew, earning Oscars for star Robert De Niro, its director, composer, screenwriters and art directors. The film also earned the Best Picture Oscar for that year. The replacement of Sean Connery, first with George Lazenby and then with Roger Moore, in the James Bond series created a minor bump for the '60s hit in the seventies. While 1973's Live and Let Die was a moderate success, the following films in the series didn't live up to expectations. The highest grossing of the seventies Bond films, 1979's Moonraker, is viewed by many as the weakest of the franchise. Other massively successful films would soon take Bond's place in the seventies. It was at this time that the blockbuster was born. While the 1973 horror classic The Exorcist was among the top five grossing films of the seventies, the first film given the blockbuster distinction was 1975's Jaws. Released on June 20th, the film about a series of horrific deaths related to a massive great white shark was director Steven Spielberg's first big-budget Hollywood production, coming in at a cool $9 million in cost. The film slowly grew in ticket sales and became one of the most profitable films of its time, ending with a $260 million dollar gross in the United States alone. The film won Academy Awards for its skillful editing, chilling score, and sound recording. It was also nominated for Best Picture that year, though it lost to Milos Forman's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (which also won acting awards for Jack Nicholson and Louise Fletcher). Louise Fletcher The massive success of Jaws was eclipsed just two years later by another legendary blockbuster and film franchise. The George Lucas science-fiction epic, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, hit theater screens in May of 1977, and became a major hit, growing in ticket sales throughout the summer, and the rest of the year. In time earning some $460 million, the good versus evil fantasy set in space was not soon surpassed. The film's breathtaking visual effects won an Academy Award. The film also won for John Williams's uplifting score, as well as art direction, costume design, film editing, and sound. A New Hope effectively removed any specter of studio bankruptcy that had haunted the studios since early in the decade. When a television film, The Star Wars Holiday Special, was released as a spin-off from A New Hope in 1978, it failed to receive the status of the original film, and was deemed a flop. It would be two years until the Star Wars series would be revived with The Empire Strikes Back. Another success in visual effects came the same year as A New Hope, with Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, another blockbuster and alien contact set in the wilderness. For the picture, Spielberg received his first Oscar nomination for direction. Throughout the seventies, the horror film developed into a lucrative genre of film. It began in 1973 with the terrifying The Exorcist, directed by William Friedkin and starring the young Linda Blair. The film saw massive success, and the first of several sequels was released in 1977. 1976 brought the equally creepy suspense thriller, Marathon Man, about a man who becomes the target of a former Nazi dentist's torment after his brother dies. The same year, the Devil himself made an appearance in The Omen, about the spawn of Satan. 1978's Halloween was a precursor to the "slasher" films of the eighties and nineties with its psychopathic Michael Myers. Cult horror films were also popular in the seventies, such as Wes Craven's early gore films Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes, as well as Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. In the mid-seventies movies began to reflect the disenfranchisement brought by the excesses of the past twenty years. A deeply unsettling look at alienation and city life, Taxi Driver earned international praise, first at the Cannes Film Festival and then at the Academy Awards, where it was nominated for Best Leading Actor (Robert De Niro), Best Supporting Actress (Jodie Foster), Best Score (Bernard Herrmann), and Best Picture. All the President's Men dealt with the impeachment of Richard Nixon, while Network portrayed greed and narcissism in both American society and television media. The film won Oscars for Best Actor (Peter Finch), Best Actress (Faye Dunaway), Best Supporting Actres (Beatrice Straight), and Best Screenplay (Paddy Chayefsky). Thanks to a stellar cast, experienced director, and a poignant story, Network became one of the largest critical successes of 1976. Another film, Rocky, about an average man turned boxer (played by Sylvester Stallone) won the Best Picture Academy Award that year. The film also became a major commercial success and spawned four sequels through the rest of the seventies and eighties. 1978 brought the successful sequel, Jaws 2, which featured the same cast, but without Steven Spielberg. Another tailor-made blockbuster, Dino de Laurentiis' King Kong was released, but to less than stellar success. King Kong did mark the first time a film was booked to theaters before a release date, a common practice today. King Kong, introduced the "disco lifestyle" to the world.]] The success of Woody Allen's Annie Hall in 1977 stirred a new trend in moviemaking. Annie Hall, a love story about a depressed comedian and a free-spirited woman, was followed with more sentimental films, including Neil Simon's The Goodbye Girl, An Unmarried Woman staring Jill Clayburgh,the autobiographical Lillian Hellman story, Julia, starring Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave, and 1978's Heaven Can Wait and International Velvet. Younger audiences were also beginning to be the focus of cinema, after the huge blockbusters that had attracted them back to the theater. John Travolta became popular in the pop-culture landmark films, Saturday Night Fever, which introduced Disco to middle America, and Grease, which recalled the world of the 1950s. Comedy was also given new life in the irreverent Animal House, set on a college campus during the 1960s. Up in Smoke, starring Cheech and Chong, was another irreverent comedy about marijuana use became popular among teenagers. The new television comedy program, "Saturday Night Live," launched the careers of several of its comedians, such as Chevy Chase, who starred in the 1978 hit Foul Play with rising star Goldie Hawn. Blockbusters like Superman, starring former Love of Life actor Christopher Reeve, were also still popular. The decade closed with two films chronicling the Vietnam War, Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now. Both films focused on the horrors of war and the psychological damaged caused by such horrors. Christopher Walken and director Michael Cimino earned Oscars for their work on the film, which earned a Best Picture Academy Award. Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep were also nominated for their work in The Deer Hunter. Apocalypse Now won for cinematography and sound, and earned nominations for Robert Duvall and Coppola. 1979 saw the poignant Kramer vs. Kramer, the inspiring Norma Rae, and the nuclear thriller, The China Syndrome. Meanwhile, The Onion Field and And Justice for All focused on the failures of the American judicial system. The year ended with Hal Ashby's subtle black comedy Being There and The Muppet Movie, a family film based on the Jim Henson puppet characters.
The Seventies in television

In the United States
Jim Henson At the start of the decade, long-standing trends in American television were finally reaching the end of the road. The Red Skelton Show and The Ed Sullivan Show, long-revered American institutions, were finally canceled after multi-decade spans. The "family sitcom," popularized by the travails of Ozzie and Harriet Nelson in the fifties and sixties, saw its last breath at the start of the new decade with The Brady Bunch, which ran for five seasons. Although the show was never highly rated during its original run, it has been broadcast in syndication continuously since 1974, and many children have grown up with it, causing them to think of the Bradys as the quintessential family—not only in 1970s television, but quite possibly all of American television. In the United States, television in the seventies was transformed by what became termed as "social consciousness" programming, spearheaded by television producer Norman Lear. All in the Family, his adaptation of the British television series Til Death Us Do Part, broke down television barriers. When the series premiered in 1971, Americans heard the words "fag," "nigger," and "spic" on national television programming for the first time. All in the Family was the talk of countless dinner tables throughout the country; Americans hadn't seen anything like it on television before. The show became the highest-rated program on US television schedules in the fall of 1971 and stayed in the top slot until 1976—to date, only one other series has tied All in the Family for such a long stretch at the top of the ratings. All in the Family spawned numerous spin-offs, such as Maude, starring Bea Arthur. Maude was Edith Bunker's cousin and Archie's arch-enemy. She stood for everything liberal and was an outspoken advocate of civil rights and feminism. Maude felt most comfortable, however, hiring a black woman as her housekeeper. Maude's housekeeper, Florida Evans (played by Esther Rolle), became popular in her own right and was given her own television series in 1974, Good Times, which proved to be another hit for Lear's production company. Lear developed two shows in 1975: The Jeffersons, a spinoff of All in the Family in which Archie Bunker's black next-door neighbors moved to a luxury apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, and One Day at a Time, about a single mother raising her two teenage daughters in Indianapolis. Indianapolis With the rise in socially responsible programming, the television western, a very popular genre in the 1960s, slowly died out. The first casualties were The High Chaparral and The Virginian, both NBC staples, in the spring of 1971. Bonanza suffered a blow when actor Dan Blocker died during surgery in 1972, and the show quietly ended its run the next year. CBS's Gunsmoke outlasted them all, and finally ended its run with a star-studded series finale in 1975. Bonanza actor Michael Landon helped popularize a television adaptation of the popular children's book series Little House on the Prairie. Debuting in 1974, the series ran for eight years. Little Houses competitor family drama was CBS's The Waltons, which revolved around family unity but during a different time and place—Virginia during the Great Depression. By the mid-to-late 1970s, viewers tired of socially responsible sitcoms. CBS had aired most of Lear's creations and had led the US television ratings since the mid-1950s; since then the network had received a reputation as being the "Tiffany Network," showcasing the best in television. Former CBS head of programming Fred Silverman defected to struggling ABC, which saw a glimmer of hope in the early 1970s with the #1 hit show Marcus Welby, M.D., but eventually retreated to its traditional third-place spot. Silverman was instrumental in starting a new movement in American television, centered around sexual gratification and bawdy humor and situations. Critics called the new era "jiggle television," exemplified by the crime-fighting television series Charlie's Angels, which starred up-and-coming sex symbols Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith, and Kate Jackson. Kate Jackson Silverman was responsible for green-lighting more risqué sitcoms such as Three's Company, modeled after the British series Man About the House, in which swinging single-man Jack Tripper pretended to be gay in order to live in an apartment with two single women. Mildly controversial at the time, the show quickly became a Top Ten hit in the ratings. ABC also aired Soap, a sitcom that parodied soap operas, and garnered controversy by writing in one of the first gay characters on U.S. television. Many stations refused to air the series (another storyline consisted of heroine Corinne Tate, played by Diana Canova, lusting after a priest who eventually left the priesthood to marry her). Silverman's legacy also included the "fantasy" genre, which started in 1977 with The Love Boat. The series involved popular movie and television stars in guest roles as passengers on a luxury cruise liner that sailed up and down the Pacific Coast. Silverman followed up in 1978 with Fantasy Island, starring Ricardo Montalban and Hervé Villechaize. Montalban and Villechaize were the owner and sidekick, respectively, of a luxury island resort where peoples' wishes came true. Hervé Villechaize Another popular medium in US television moving into the 1970s was the soap opera, which moved from being a genre watched exclusively by housewives to having a sizable audience of men (who largely watched The Edge of Night) and college students; the latter audience helped All My Children gain a devoted following, as it was on during many universities' traditional "lunch period." In a TIME article written about the g

Mattel
Mattel Inc. is the world's largest toy company based on revenue. It produces products including Barbie dolls, board games, and in the early 1980s, video game consoles. It was founded in 1945 by Elliot Handler and Harold "Matt" Matson (hence the name "matt-el"). Elliott Handler's wife Ruth Handler would later become president, and is credited with establishing the Barbie product line for the company in 1959.
Corporate governance
Current members of the board of directors of Mattel Inc. are: Eugene Beard, Michael Dolan, Robert Eckert, Tully Friendman, Andrea Rich, Ronald Sargent, Christopher Sinclair, Craig Sullivan, John Vogelstein, and Kathy White.
History
The company originally produced picture frames and dollhouse accessories from picture frame scraps. With the success of their dollhouse accessories, the company turned its attention to toys. The company became publicly owned in 1960. An independent audit of Mattel, released on November 3, 1975, revealed that company officials had fabricated press releases and financial information to "maintain the appearance of continued corporate growth." In 1999, the ill-advised purchase of a major software publisher, TLC, for 4+ billions of dollars led to the CEO, Jill Barad, being ousted (See Brøderbund.) In 1993, Mattel merged with the Fisher-Price toy company. In 1996, Mattel purchased Tyco Toys which was the third largest toy manufacturer at the time. Mattel serves as the parent company for American Girl (formerly Pleasant Company) and Fisher-Price. Currently, it is headquartered in El Segundo, California.
Products

Consoles

- Intellivision
- Aquarius
Toys

- Barbie and Ken dolls
- Big Jim
- Cabbage Patch Kids (1994-2000)
- Hot Wheels
- Justice League Unlimited
- Masters of the Universe action figures
- Matchbox
- Popples plush toys
- See 'n Say
- Chatty Cathy (1959-1965, 1969-1971, 1998, 2001)
Games

- UNO
- Scene It
Trivia

- The Barbie and Ken dolls are named after the Handler children.
External links

- [http://www.mattel.com Mattel]
- [http://www.fisher-price.com Fisher-Price] Category:Toy companies of the United States Category:Barbie Category:Companies based in California Category:Toy companies Category:Companies traded on the New York Stock Exchange

1990s

The 1990s refers to the years 1990 to 1999; the last decade of the 20th Century. The 90s were marked with rapid progression of globalization and global capitalism following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. Key forces shaping the decade were the Gulf War; popularization of Personal Computer and Internet leading to the dot.com boom.

Events and trends

While optimism and hopes were high following the collapse of Communism, the backlash of the Cold War's effect was only beginning, precipitating the continuation of terrorism in Third World regions that were once the frontlines for American and Soviet foreign politics, particularly in Asia. However, during the 1990s many First World economies such as the United States, Canada, Ireland, Australia, and South Korea experienced steady economic growth for nearly the entire decade. The United Kingdom, after the recession of 1991-92 and Black Wednesday, experienced a run of 51 consecutive quarters of economic growth that stretched into the new millenium. Even less affluent nations such as Malaysia saw tremendous improvements in economic prosperity and quality of life during the 1990s. Many countries, institutions, companies, and organizations also viewed the 90s decade as "a prosperous time", meaning that almost all of them rebounded after many years of failure. Some examples include Apple Computer's revival of power after being at the edge of bankruptcy, breakthroughs in many fields of technology that includes the Internet, virtual reality. Oil and Gas was discovered in many countries and Pope John Paul II's papacy reached its peak. Nevertheless, the 1990s brought tragic conflicts as well, like the Balkan Wars, the Rwandan genocide, the Battle of Mogadishu in Somalia and the first Gulf War.

Criticism/Backlash of the Decade

Despite denials from various sociologists and media pundits, some feel that the 90s were an era of increasing materialism and growing hypocrisy continued from the 1980s. In general it could still be said that the mindset of the 1980s and 1990s were more or less the same. The 1990s are also widely critized for their controversial pop culture obsessed with gore, sex, violence, and language, along with the 2000s to a somewhat lesser extent. The 1990s nonetheless have a very positive receiving into the 2000s and are still considered quite "modern" even as of 2006, with many genres of media from the decade still being quite cool among youth during the 2000s as no great revolutions in pop culture have occurred for some time and only moderate backlash of the decade itself has yet occurred. Also, while not a criticism of the decade per se, some people see the 1990s as the beginning of the 21st Century rather than the end of the 20th Century in an abstract sense based on the fact that the Cold War, a definitive phoenomenon of the 20th Century, was over by about 1991 and the tech boom began to take off a couple years after, and very 21st Century events such as the rise of the Internet and other information technologies and the expansion of Islamic terrorism began to become prominent in the 1990s.

Technology

Internet]
- The Pentium processor is developed by Intel.
- Microsoft introduces Windows 95 to the market, which gained immediate popularity.
- Explosive growth of the Internet, decrease in the cost of computers and other technology.
- Advancements with computer modems, ISDN, cable modems and DSL lead to faster connection to the Internet.
- The development of web browsers such as Netscape and Internet Explorer makes surfing the World Wide Web easier and more user friendly.
- The Java programming language is developed by Sun Microsystems.
- Businesses begin E-commerce websites; companies such as Amazon.com, eBay, AOL, and Yahoo! grew rapidly on the Internet.
- Cell phones burst in popularity and decrease in size, becoming a necessity for modern life.
- Pagers and PDAs become popular communication tools.
- E-mail becomes popular; as a result Microsoft acquires the popular Hotmail.com.
- Year 2000 problem (commonly known as Y2K).
- Microsoft Windows operating system becomes virtually ubiquitous on IBM PCs.
- Development of free operating system Linux is started.
- Breakthrough of compact disc technology, introduced in the 1980s, later branching into DVD.

Science

DVD]
- Detection of extrasolar planets orbiting stars other than the sun.
- The cloning of Dolly the sheep is achieved.
- Human Genome Project begun.
- DNA identification of individuals finds wide application in criminal law.
- Hubble Space Telescope launched in 1990; revolutionizes astronomy.
- Protease inhibitors introduced allowing HAART therapy against HIV; drastically reduces AIDS mortality.
- NASA's spacecraft Pathfinder lands on Mars and deploys a small roving vehicle, Sojourner, that analyzes the planet's geology and atmosphere.
- The Hale-Bopp comet swings past the sun for the first time in 4,200 years.
- Development of biodegradable products, replacing products made from styrofoam; advanced methods for recycling of waste products (such as paper, glass, aluminum) are developed.
- Genetically engineered crops are developed for commercial use.
- Discovery of dark matter, dark energy, and brown dwarves, and first confirmation of black holes.
- The Galileo probe orbits Jupiter, studying the planet and its moons extensively.

War, peace, and politics

Jupiter] Jupiter]
- Reunification of Germany on October 3 1990.
- End of apartheid in South Africa (1990) and election of ANC government of Nelson Mandela.
- Gulf War (resulting from Iraq's invasion of Kuwait) and United Nations embargo on Iraq in 1991.
- North Yemen and South Yemen merge to form Yemen (1991).
- Break up of the Soviet Union in 1991 - the end of the Cold War, United States as sole world superpower.
- The bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993 by an explosive-filled van leads to awareness of international terrorism as a rising threat.
- Eritrea gains independence from Ethiopia (1993).
- European Union is declared in 1992.
- Military actions in Somalia in 1993 lead to questions of the United States' role as a policing officer of the world. (see also, Black Hawk Down).
- Rwandan genocide kills one million people, in 1994.
- The birth of the "Second Republic" in Italy, with the Mani Pulite investigations of 1994.
- Peace process begins in Northern Ireland in 1995
- Balkan war in former Yugoslavia in 1995.
- A decade of women presidents in the Republic of Ireland.
- The United Kingdom hands sovereignty of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China on July 1, 1997.
- U.S. Congressman Newt Gingrich crafts his manifesto "Contract with America", leading his Republican Party to become the controlling majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
- U.S. president Bill Clinton's sex scandal with Monica Lewinsky and his impeachment trial in 1998, which lasts the entire year.
- Anti-globalization protests.
- The Second Congo War start in 1998 in central Africa and includes 5 different cultures and 7 different nations. It goes on until 2002.
- In May 1999, Pakistan sends troops covertly to occupy strategic peaks in Kashmir. A month later the Kargil War with India results in a political fiasco for Nawaz Sharif, followed by a military withdrawal to the Line of Control. The incident leads to a military coup in October in which the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is ousted by Army Chief Pervez Musharraf.
- Portugal hands sovereignty of Macau to the People's Republic of China on December 20, 1999.

Economics

- Development of GATT, the World Trade Organization and other global economic institutions.
- The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which phases out trade barriers between the United States, Mexico and Canada is signed into law by U.S. President Bill Clinton.
- After 1992 the booming of the US stock market, in reference to which Alan Greenspan coined the memorable phrase "irrational exuberance", which eventually stretched into the dot-com boom / dot-com bubble.
- Financial crisis hits East and Southeast Asia in 1997 and 1998 after a long period of phenomenal economic development. See East Asian Tigers.

Culture

Trends/Various

- The Gay 1990s The 1990s saw an increase in gay visibility. Tv shows like thirtysomething,My So called Life and Ellen featured gay characters, Movies like The Birdcage,In and Out and Kiss Me Guido saw mainstream sucess, and celebrities like K.D Lang and George Michael coming out of the closet. Even President Bill Clinton generally held a pro gay rights viewpoint.
- Douglas Coupland publishes the novel Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularizing the term Generation X as the name of the generation born in the late 1960s and early 1970s (then college-age).
- Reality television explodes on MTV with the popularity of The Real World (1992-); along with Road Rules (1995-), Real World/Road Rules Challenge (1998), and Real World reunions, these shows remained popular throughout the 1990s.
- Video games become more advanced, but still a far cry from the systems of the 2000s. The more influential game systems of the Nineties include the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, the Sony Playstation, and the Sega Dreamcast.
- Extreme sports reached a new height in popularity, and by 1995, were given their own annual tournament on US cable network ESPN, the X-Games.
- Black becomes a dominant color in fashion, among several dark colors (see Goth, The Matrix, and Regis Philbin).
- Dogma 95 becomes the leading European artistic film movement by the end of the decade.
- Professional wrestling became extremely popular. After scandals and near bankruptcy due to competition from World Championship Wrestling (WCW), the World Wrestling Federation was repackaged more edgier and realistic. Superstars such as Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Mick Foley, Steve Borden (Sting), Bill Goldberg, Raven, Sabu and others became household names. At the same time, Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) led wrestling's entry into edgier angles.
- Recreational sports such as rock climbing, mountain biking, sky diving, snowboarding, mountain climbing, bungee jumping, in-line skating, kayaking and rowing become hugely popular.
- Extended alcohol sales are implemented to reduce alcohol abuse.
- The 1990s remains a somewhat "cool" decade into the 2000s as many aspects of the 90s continue to be important into the next decade, see New Nineties.

Music

- Grunge music, popularized by Nirvana, big from the fall of 1991 through 1994 but influential to rock up to 2005 (see Post-Grunge), Grunge movement followed by the Britpop movement of about 1995 to 1997 which was in turn followed by numetal.
- Teen pop held over from the late 1980s popular into 1990, returns with Backstreet Boys and Spice Girls in latter third of the decade
- Radiohead comes to be one of the most critically and commercially loved bands since The Beatles. Two of their albums, The Bends and Ok Computer top lists at the end of the decade.
- Rap music gains widespread mainstream acceptance throughout the decade, starting with the success of MC Hammer, Public Enemy and Vanilla Ice around 1989-91 and ending with hip-hop inspired by Puff Daddy, Dr. Dre and Eminem c. 1997-99. By 1999 hip hop had definitely passed rock and roll in popularity.
- Music festivals such as Lollapalooza became popular; a fusing of genres from alternative rock, rap, punk rock and garage bands.
- Rock music begins to be referred to as "alternative" as it is originated in 1980s underground rock and 1970s punk and begins to lose popularity to hip hop.
- Trance, techno and electronica music becomes widely popular at rave parties in Europe/USA and in pop culture, particularly later in the decade. The drug Ecstasy, (aka MDMA or 'X') is popularized by rave culture.
- 1980s backlash, beginning in about 1991 and lasting into the 2000s. During most of the 1990s anything "Eighties" was considered to be ultimately uncool.
- Music becomes more profane, by end of decade a Parental Advisory sticker becomes acceptable rather than controversial.
- In America, country music becomes more mainstream with popular chart topping artist such as Garth Brooks, Shania Twain, LeAnn Rimes, Faith Hill, and Tim McGraw. The trend decreases somewhat in the 2000s.

Television

- Japanimation becomes popular in the United States in the late 1990s with shows Pokemon, Dragonball Z, and Cowboy Bebop.
- Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers gains popularity with kids in the mid 90s; leading to entire Power Rangers series. Barney and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles also popular
- MTV moves away from music videos and into original television shows such as The Real World, which is cited as the inspiration for the Reality TV boom of the 2000s.
- Cartoons aimed at an adult audience become popular. Among the most successful are The Simpsons (1989-), Ren & Stimpy (1991-1995), Beavis and Butt-head (1993-1997), South Park (1997-), King of the Hill (1997-), and Family Guy (1999-2002, 2005-).
- Television networks increase programs aimed at twenty- and thirty-somethings. Some of the popular are Beverly Hills 90210 (1990-2000), Melrose Place (1992-1999), Party of Five (1994-2000), Ally McBeal (1997-2002), Friends (1994-2004), and Seinfeld (1989-1998).
- Notable television sitcoms aimed at the teen/preteen market include Boy Meets World (1993-2000), Full House (1987-1995), Family Matters (1989-1998), and Third Rock From The Sun (1996-2001), among many others.
- Major 1990s slang words/phrases, mostly related to hip hop include "homie", "phat", "da bomb", "Audi 5000", "tight", "word to your mother", "Talk to the hand", "You go girl!", and "Wasssuppp!"

Other significant events

Talk to the hand]
- The massive global human impact on the environment, which first garnered attention in the 60s, was widely acknowledged.
- Divorce and scandal rocked the British Royal House of Windsor.
- The assassination of Selena Quintanilla.
- Sex and violence in the media increase, especially in the late part of the decade. Profanity in music reaches peak in the late 90s.
- O.J. Simpson's trial, described in the media as the "trial of the century".
- You go, girl! becomes a popular phrase in the media as feminism is more widely accepted and publicised in the media with The Spice Girls, the WNBA, women's boxing, Sex and the City and others showcasing modern femininity.
- The Vieques controversy.
- The Oklahoma City Bombing, the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, killing 168.
- The Waco massacre prompts a nationwide debate in the U.S. about the freedom of association right of the Michigan Militia, Montana Militia and other radical groups.
- Crime levels in the U.S. peak in 1991, begin to fall afterwards to the lowest levels since the late 1960s at end of decade.
- Drug use in the U.S. reaches an all-time low in 1992 before increasing, reaching its peak in 1997 before declining again.
- Princess Diana dies in a car accident in 1997. Debates of accident vs assassination rage.
- Mother Teresa, the Roman Catholic nun who won the Nobel Peace Prize, dies at age 87.
- 21-year-old Golfer Tiger Woods wins the Masters Tournament by a record 12 strokes; becoming the youngest and first African-American to win the Masters.
- The Omagh bombing in Omagh, County Tyrone, Ireland which kills 29 civilians (including a woman pregnant with twins) and injures hundreds more.
- John F. Kennedy, Jr., his wife Carolyn Bessette and sister-in-law Lauren Bessette are killed when Kennedy's private plane crashes off the coast of Martha's Vineyard.
- American cyclist Lance Armstrong wins his first Tour de France in 1999, less than two years after battling testicular cancer.
- Beer keg registration becomes popular public policy in U.S.

People

World leaders

- Prime Minister Bob Hawke (Australia)
- Prime Minister Paul Keating (Australia)
- Prime Minister John Howard (Australia)
- President Fernando Affonso Collor de Mello (Brazil)
- President Itamar Franco (Brazil)
- President Fernando Henrique Cardoso (Brazil)
- Prime Minister Brian Mulroney (Canada)
- Prime Minister Kim Campbell (Canada)
- Prime Minister Jean Chrétien (Canada)
- "Paramount Leader" Deng Xiaoping (People's Republic of China)
- President Jiang Zemin (People's Republic of China)
- President Lee Teng-hui (Republic of China on Taiwan)
- President Franjo Tuđman (Croatia)
- Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen (Denmark)
- President Hosni Mubarak (Egypt)
- President François Mitterrand (France)
- President Jacques Chirac (France)
- Chancellor Helmut Kohl (Germany)
- Chancellor Gerhard Schröder (Germany)
- Governor David Clive Wilson (Hong Kong (under British rule))
- Governor Christopher Francis Patten (Hong Kong (under British rule))
- Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa (Hong Kong, People's Republic of China)
- Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee (India)
- President Mohammad Khatami (Iran)
- President Saddam Hussein (Iraq)
- Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (Israel)
- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Israel)
- Emperor Akihito (Japan)
- Governor Vasco Joaquim Rocha Vieira (Macau (under Portuguese rule))
- Chief Executive Edmund Ho (Macau, People's Republic of China)
- President Yasser Arafat (Palestinian Authority)
- Pope Pope John Paul II
- President Corazon Aquino (Philippines)
- President Fidel Ramos (Philippines)
- President Joseph Estrada (Philippines)
- Prime Minister Mike Moore (New Zealand)
- Prime Minister Jim Bolger (New Zealand)
- Prime Minister Jenny Shipley (New Zealand)
- Prime Minister Helen Clark (New Zealand)
- President Ion Iliescu (Romania)
- President Emil Constantinescu (Romania)
- President Boris Yeltsin (Russia)
- Taoiseach Charles Haughey (Republic of Ireland)
- Taoiseach Albert Reynolds (Republic of Ireland)
- Taoiseach John Bruton (Republic of Ireland)
- Taoiseach Bertie Ahern (Republic of Ireland)
- President Boris Yeltsin (Russia)
- President Wee Kim Wee (Singapore)
- President Ong Teng Cheong (Singapore)
- President Sellapan Ramanathan (Singapore)
- President Frederik Willem de Klerk (South Africa)
- President Nelson Mandela (South Africa)
- President Kim Dae-jung (South Korea)
- President Mikhail Gorbachev (Soviet Union)
- King Juan Carlos I (Spain)
- President Felipe González (Spain)
- President José María Aznar (Spain)
- Queen Elizabeth II (United Kingdom et al.)
- Prime Minister John Major (United Kingdom)
- Prime Minister Tony Blair (United Kingdom)
- President George H.W. Bush (United States)
- President Bill Clinton (United States)
- President Slobodan Milošević (Federal Republic of Yugoslavia)

Entertainers

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia] Federal Republic of Yugoslavia]] Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
- 2pac
- Ace of Base
- Adam Sandler
- Aaliyah
- Alice in Chains
- Alanis Morrissette (Jagged Little Pill)
- Annie Lennox
- Anthony Hopkins (The Silence of the Lambs, Titus)
- Ashley Judd
- Beavis and Butt-Head
- Ben Affleck (Good Will Hunting)
- Bill Hicks
- Billy Bob Thornton
- Boyz II Men
- Bret Hart
- Britney Spears
- Bruce Willis (the Die Hard series, Pulp Fiction)
- Mariah Carey
- Dana Carvey (Wayne's World)
- Dean Cain
- Carmen Electra
- Christina Aguilera
- Cuba Gooding Jr (Boyz N the Hood, Jerry Maguire)
- Amy Grant
- Dave Matthews Band
- Demi Moore (Ghost, Striptease, A Few Good Men)
- Denzel Washington ( Malcolm X, Mo' Better Blues, Philadelphia)
- Destiny's Child (Destiny's Child, The Writing's On The Wall)
- Ellen DeGeneres (Ellen)
- Elizabeth Berkley (Saved by the Bell, Showgirls)
- Eurythmics
- Friends
- Courtney Cox
- Jennifer Aniston
- Lisa Kudrow
- Matt LeBlanc
- Matthew Perry
- David Schwimmer
- The Fugees
- Green Day (Dookie, Nimrod)
- Gwyneth Paltrow (Shakespeare in Love, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Se7en)
- Liam Gallagher of Oasis
- Noel Gallagher of Oasis
- Teri Hatcher
- Whitney Houston (The Bodyguard, Waiting to Exhale)
- Halle Berry (Introducing Dorothy Dandridge,Bullworth)
- Hanson
- Harrison Ford
- Helen Hunt (Mad About You, Twister, As Good as It Gets)
- Hootie & The Blowfish
- Jack Nicholson
- Jerry Seinfeld (Seinfeld)
- Jerry Springer
- Jim Carrey (Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask)
- Julia Roberts (Pretty Woman, Notting Hill)
- Kate Winslet (Titanic)
- Keanu Reeves (The Matrix)
- Kurt Cobain
- Leonardo DiCaprio (Titanic)
- Liam Neeson
- Macaulay Culkin (Home Alone)
- The Undertaker
- Martin Lawrence (House Party, Martin, Bad Boys)
- Mary J Blige (What's the 411?)
- Matt Damon (Good Will Hunting)
- Meg Ryan
- Mel Gibson (Braveheart)
- Michael Jackson
- Michael Keaton
- Michelle Pfeiffer (The Age of Innocence, Batman Returns)
- Mike Myers (Wayne's World, Saturday Night Live, Austin Powers)
- Mira Sorvino
- Nicole Kidman (My Life, Eyes Wide Shut)
- Notorious B.I.G.
- Nirvana
- Oasis
- Phil Collins
- Pamela Anderson (Baywatch)
- Pearl Jam
- "Image:Princesymbol.png" The artist formerly known as Prince
- Queen Latifah (Living Single, Set It Off)
- Quentin Tarantino (Pulp Fiction)
- Ralph Fiennes (Schindler's List, The English Patient)
- Jeri Ryan (Star Trek: Voyager)
- Samuel L. Jackson (Goodfellas, Pulp Fiction)
- Sandra Bullock (Speed, A Time to Kill)
- Shawn Michaels
- Spice Girls
- Stone Cold Steve Austin
- Tim Burton (Edward Scissorhands, Batman Returns)
- Tiffani-Amber Thiessen (Saved by the Bell, Beverly Hills 90210 )
- TLC (Lisa "Left-Eye" Lopes, T-Boz, Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas)
- Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan, Philadelphia, Toy Story, The Green Mile)
- Toni Braxton ( Toni Braxton (album) )
- U2 (Achtung Baby)
- Uma Thurman (Pulp Fiction)
- Whoopi Goldberg (Sister Act, Ghost, Ghosts of Mississippi, Hollywood Squares)
- Will Smith (The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Men In Black)

Films

See also: 1990s in film

Books & Literature

Sports figures

Sonya lee

History

Likenesses

Donna Summer

Donna Summer (born Donna Andrea Gaines on December 31, 1948) is an American pop music singer best known for a string of disco music hits in the 1970s that earned her the title "Queen of Disco".

Career

Summer was a rarity in the 1970s disco scene because her career began before the disco explosion and continued afterward. Even though she is one of the best-known artists of the disco era, Summer has covered different genres including R&B, rock and roll and gospel music, earning her Grammy Awards in those categories. Her work is still critically acclaimed and remains one of the few disco artists accepted by modern rock critics. Born in the Roxbury neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, Summer began performing in her church's choir. She later joined a rock group called Crow. A few months before graduating from high school, Summer dropped out and joined the German productions of Hair, Godspell, and Show Boat over the next few years. She eventually settled in Europe, joining the Viennese Folk Opera and participating in numerous musicals. After resettling in Munich, Germany, Summer married Helmut Sommer ("Summer" is an anglicization of his last name) and did various musical jobs in studios and theaters for several years. In 1971, Summer released "Sally Go 'Round the Roses", her first solo recording. The single was unsuccessful, however, and Summer had to wait until 1974 to launch a solo career. In that year, she, Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte (who met assisting Three Dog Night in the studio) worked together to produce "The Hostage", a European hit. Lady of the Night, Summer's first LP, was released in 1974 with moderate success in Europe. Summer recorded "Love To Love You Baby", which was a huge European hit. Casablanca Records soon began distributing the single in the United States, and it became a sensation there as well. This was followed by an album, Love to Love You Baby, critically acclaimed then and now, notable for including a seventeen-minute version of the title track. This established a pattern that made Summer unusual in the disco world: she focused just as much, if not more, on full-length albums instead of singles. Continuing to work with Moroder and Bellotte, Love Trilogy (1976) and the concept album Four Seasons of Love (1976) were hits, though not as popular as Love to Love You Baby. I Remember Yesterday (1977) included the memorable hit single "I Feel Love", the first hit song recorded with an entirely synthesized backing track. This song, which became a major hit, is enormously influential in the development of disco, electronica and techno music, thanks to Moroder's innovative production. Once Upon a Time was released soon after I Remember Yesterday; it was another concept album, concerning the fairy tale of Cinderella. After acting (and releasing a Grammy-winning song on the soundtrack) in the comedy Thank God It's Friday, Summer released a live album Live and More, which became another smash hit album and included the 17-minute long studio recorded cover of "MacArthur Park". Summer's songwriting was showcased on Bad Girls (1979), which included a hit single in the title track, as well as "Hot Stuff", which won Summer the Grammy for Best Female Rock Vocalist. When a greatest hits album, On the Radio, became a #1 hit, Summer was the first artist with three consecutive #1 double albums. Summer then decided to leave Casablanca and sign to Geffen Records, then just starting up. Her first Geffen album was The Wanderer (1980), which included more rock and roll and R&B influences. The follow-up album, I'm a Rainbow, was not released until 1996 because Geffen did not think it was good enough. Instead, Geffen had Summer drop Moroder and Bellotte, her longtime songwriters, and paired her with music sensation Quincy Jones on the self-titled album Donna Summer, which produced the dance hit "Love Is in Control (Finger on the Trigger)", a Top 40 hit "Woman in Me" and the Vangelis penned "State of Independence", which became a huge hit in Europe with its New Age feel and star chorus that included Christopher Cross and Michael Jackson. This song was the inspiration for Quincy Jones to later create "We Are the World". In 1983, Summer released She Works Hard for the Money, which included a well-remembered hit in the title track. Summer's career has not been without controversy. In the early 1980s, an unpublished rumor about the singer began circulating among the gay community. She was rumored to have made comments critical of homosexuality, thus alienating a large part of her fan base. However, Summer has often said in interviews that she never made the homophobic remarks attributed to her. In the late 1980s, the rumor was published in a news item and Summer took legal action. The case was settled out of court for an undisclosed sum. Summer has continued to show her acceptance of her gay fans with appearances at charity functions such as the GMHC (Gay Men's Health Crisis) benefit at Carnegie Hall. Summer's career slowed in the 1980s with the arrival of two daughters. Her career picked up speed again in 1989 with her Stock Aitken Waterman collaboration Another Place and Time album. The first single, "This Time I Know It's for Real", became a huge hit, first in Europe and later in the United States, and brought her back to the top of the charts. A new remix of "I Feel Love" was a big UK hit all over again in 1995. In 1991, Summer released the CD Mistaken Identity, which included songs criticizing racism (the title track) and the first Gulf War ("Let There Be Peace"). Throughout the 1990s, Summer continued to work; she recorded a duet with Liza Minnelli ("Does He Love You?") and produced numerous dance hits such as "Melody of Love", which became the Billboard number one dance hit of the year; "I Will Go with You", the dance version of the beautiful Andrea Bocelli song "Con Te Partirò"; and "You're So Beautiful", a club anthem she co-wrote with legendary DJ Tony Moran. As well as her #1 U.S dance chart hit "Love is a Healer". In 1998, Summer was the first artist to receive a Grammy award for Best Dance Recording (for her hit "Carry On"). In 1999, Summer held a televised live concert on VH-1 called Donna Summer - Live and More Encore, in which she performed a medley of her original hits, as well as new material, including an updated version of "No More Tears", which she performed with Austrialian pop diva, Tina Arena. An CD and DVD of the concert was released shortly after. In 2003, Donna Summer released a greatest-hits compilation called The Journey, which rocketed into the UK Top 10 in the following year, thanks to her appearance on ITV1 show Discomania. On September 20, 2004 Donna was among the first artist to be inducted into the newly formed Dance Music Hall Of Fame in New York City. She was inducted in two catagories: 1) Artist Inductees, along with fellow disco legends The Bee Gees and Barry White and 2) Record Inductees for her classic hit I Feel Love. Summer added to her credits in October 2004, when she performed "God Bless America" during the seventh-inning stretch at Game 2 of the 2004 World Series at Boston's Fenway Park. As of 2005, Summer has received 5 Grammy Awards and 6 American Music Awards, as well as 24 gold and platinum certifications in the United States and 19 gold and silver certifications in Great Britain. Also in the summer of 2005 Donna will tour for the first time in 5 years and opened her first official Web site ( [http://www.donnasummer.com/] ). Over 100 million copies of her records have been sold worldwide. Today, Summer and her family make their home in Nashville, Tennessee.

Discography

Notes: US Top data: Billboard Hot 100 and Hot Dance Music/Club Play for singles, Billboard 200 for albums; UK Top data for singles and albums is from UK Singles Chart.

Main albums

- 1974 Lady of the Night (Holland/Belgium/Germany)
- 1975 Love to Love You Baby (#8 US,#11 UK)
- 1976 Love Trilogy (#18 US, #26 UK)
- 1976 Four Seasons of Love (#22 US)
- 1977 I Remember Yesterday (#9 US,#1 UK)
- 1977 Once Upon a Time (#16 US,#18 UK)
- 1978 Live and More (#1 US,#7 UK)
- 1979 Bad Girls (#1 US,#5 UK)
- 1980 The Wanderer (#4 US,#25 UK)
- 1982 Donna Summer (#10 US,#13 UK)
- 1983 She Works Hard for the Money (#3 US,#10 UK)
- 1984 Cats Without Claws (#24 US,#30 UK)
- 1987 All Systems Go (#20 US)
- 1989 Another Place and Time (#2 US,#4 UK)
- 1991 Mistaken Identity (#72 US, #50 UK)
- 1994 Christmas Spirit
- 1996 I'm a Rainbow (originally set for release in 1981)
- 1999 Live and More... Encore (#14 US, #20 UK)

Compilations

- 1978 Greatest Hits (#4 UK)
- 1979 Greatest Hits On the Radio Vol. I & II (US Sales: 2.500.000 mil.) (#1 US,#24 UK)
- 1980 Walk Away: Collector's Edition (#29 US)
- 1885 The Summer Collection
- 1987 The Dance Collection
- 1990 The Best of Donna Summer (#12 UK)
- 1993 The Donna Summer Anthology
- 1994 Endless Summer (#37 UK)
- 1998 Greatest Hits
- 2003 The Journey: The Very Best of Donna Summer (#111 US,#6 UK)
- 2005 Gold

Singles

- 1971 Sally Go 'Round the Roses
- 1974 Denver Dream
- 1974 The Hostage
- 1974 Lady of The Night
- 1975 Love to Love you Baby (#2 US, #4 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1976 Could It Be Magic (#28 US, #40 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1976 Try Me, I Know We Can Make It (#32 US, #1 Disco US)
- 1976 Wasted/Come With Me (#1 Disco US)
- 1976 Spring Affair (#26 US, #1 Disco US)
- 1976 Winter Melody (#16 US, #27 UK)
- 1977 (Theme from "The Deep")Down Deep Inside (#18 US, #5 UK, #3 US Dance)
- 1977 I Remember Yesterday (#14 UK, #1 US Dance as part of album of the same title)
- 1977 Can't We Just Sit Down (#20 US)
- 1977 I Feel Love (#6 US, #1 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1977 Love's Unkind (#3 UK, #1 Disco US)
- 1977 Once Upon a Time (#1 Disco US)
- 1977 I Love You (#20 US, #10 UK)
- 1978 Back In Love Again (#29 UK)
- 1978 Last Dance (#4 US, #51 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1978 MacArthur Park (#1 US, #5 UK, #1 US Dance as part of "MacArthur Park Suite" medley)
- 1978 Rumour Has It (#32 US, #19 UK)
- 1979 Bad Girls (#1 US, #11 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1979 Dim All the Lights (#2 US, #29 UK, #54 US Dance)
- 1979 Sunset People (#46 UK)
- 1979 No More Tears(Enough Is Enough)(with Barbra Streisand) (#1 US, #3 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1979 Heaven Knows (#4 US,#34 UK, #1 US Dance as part of "Mac Arthur Park Suite" medley)
- 1979 Hot Stuff (#1 US, #11 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1980 On the Radio (#3 US, #32 UK, #8 US Dance)
- 1980 Walk Away (#21 US)
- 1980 The Wanderer(#3 US, #48 UK, #8 US Dance as part of album)
- 1981 Cold Love (#31 US, #44 UK)
- 1981 Who Do You Think You're Foolin' (#40 US)
- 1982 Love Is In Control (Finger On the Trigger) (#10 US, #18 UK, #3 US Dance)
- 1982 State of Independence (#19 US, #14 UK)
- 1982 I Feel Love (remix) (#21 UK)
- 1983 She Works Hard For the Money (#3 US, #25 UK, #3 US Dance)
- 1983 Unconditional Love (#41 US, #14 UK)
- 1983 The Woman In Me (#33 US, #62 UK)
- 1984 Love Has a Mind of Its Own (#35 US)
- 1984 Supernatural Love (#12 US, #12 US Dance)
- 1984 There Goes My Baby (#3 US)
- 1987 Dinner with Gershwin (#12 US, #13 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1988 All Systems Go (#54 UK)
- 1989 Breakaway (#49 UK, #31 Hot Dance US)
- 1989 Love's About Change My Heart (#24 US, #20 UK, #3 US Dance)
- 1989 When Love Takes Over You (#72 UK)
- 1989 This Time I Know It's For Real (#7 US, #3 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1989 I Don't Wanna Get Hurt (#7 UK)
- 1991 When Love Cries (#77 US)
- 1991 Work That Magic (#74 UK)
- 1994 Melody of Love (#1 Hot Dance US, #21 UK)
- 1994 Any Way At All
- 1995 I Feel Love (remix) (#8 UK, #9 US Dance)
- 1996 State Of Independence (remix) (#13 UK)
- 1997 Carry On (#65 UK, #25 Hot Dance US)
- 1999 I Will Go With You (#30 US, #44 UK, #1 US Dance)
- 1999 Love Is the Healer (#1 Hot Dance US)
- 2000 The Power of One (#2 Hot Dance US)
- 2004 Dream-A-Lot's Theme (#20 Hot Dance US)
- 2004 You're So Beautiful (Ultimate Club Mix) (#5 Hot Dance US)
- 2005 I Got Your Love (Just released)

Other Meanings

- Donna Summer is also the recording name of Jason Forrest, an experimental and breakcore musician. He is a fan of his more famous namesake's music.

External links

- [http://www.donnasummer.com/ Official Donna Summer Site]
- [http://www.demetz.net/Moroder-Summer/ The Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder Tribute]
- [http://pub15.bravenet.com/sitering/show.php?usernum=1215130285 The Donna Summer Web Ring]
- [http://www.donna-tribute.com/ The Donna Summer Tribute Site]
- [http://people.delphiforums.com/raulcm/Pandora.htm Pandora's Box: A tribute to Donna Summer's Life and Music]
- [http://www.donnasummer.it/ Donna Summer Time]
- [http://www.donnasummer.org/ Donna Summer Internet]
- Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna Summer, Donna

Earnie Shavers

Earnie Shavers (born August 31, 1945) was a professional boxer. Although Shavers never became Heavyweight champion, he has often been rated as perhaps the hardest puncher in heavyweight history. Shavers compiled one of the most amazing records in boxing history. At one point he won almost thirty fights in a row by knockout. He scored over 20 victories in the first round alone. Shavers fought Muhammad Ali at the Madison Square Garden on September 29, 1977, losing a close decision. Ali later said Shavers was one of the toughest men he ever fought. Shavers again fought for the title against champion Larry Holmes at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada on September of 1979. Shavers knocked Holmes down in round seven but was later knocked out in round eleven. Holmes later said Shavers' blow was the hardest he had ever taken in his career. Shavers retired in 1983 after retinal problems were discovered in his eyes. After retirement, he became an ordained Christian minister and moved to Phoenix, where he pastored for many years. He moved to England to pastor a church there in the early 2000s. He has been on the Benny Hinn TV show several times. He has visited Ali several times and he says he, Ali, and George Foreman have become very good friends over the years. Shavers was a trouble shooting referee in professional wrestling for a little while after his retirement. In 2003, Shavers was ranked number 10 among boxing's hardest punchers in history by Ring Magazine. However, many feel that Shavers is the hardest puncher of all time, even more so than sluggers George Foreman and Mike Tyson. Ali, who also fought Foreman and Sonny Liston, both of whom are candidates for the title of 'hardest puncher ever', seemed to indicate that he felt that Shavers was the hardest puncher he ever faced. Holmes, who faced Mike Tyson, said that Shavers hit harder than Tyson. However, Shavers' punching power was not enough to compensate for his weak chin and poor stamina. Shavers, Earnie Shavers, Earnie Shavers, Earnie Shavers, Earnie Shavers, Earnie

Flokkur:Flugfélög

Flokkur:Fyrirtæki

dieta kopenhaska przetargi Bramy gara�owe encyklopedia online blackjack

:: RELATED NEWS ::

Castelletto Uzzone
Castelletto Uzzone ist eine Gemeinde mit 374 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Cuneo (CN), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Dego, Gottasecca, Levice, Pezzolo Valle Uzzone, Piana Cr

Castelletto d'Erro
Castelletto d'Erro ist eine Gemeinde mit 153 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Alessandria (AL), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Bistagno, Cartosio, Melazzo, Montechiaro d'Acqui und Read More...

Castelletto d'Orba
Castelletto d'Orba ist eine Gemeinde mit 1.845 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Alessandria (AL), Region Piemont. Die Gemeinde besteht aus den Ortsteilen Cazzuli, Crebini und Passaronda. Nachbargemeinden sind Capriata d'Orba

Castelletto sopra Ticino
Castelletto sopra Ticino ist eine Gemeinde mit 8.756 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Novara (NO), Region Piemont. Sie liegt am Fluss Ticino gegenüber von Sesto Calende. Nachbargemeinden sind Borgo Ticino, Comignago,

Castellinaldo
Castellinaldo ist eine Gemeinde mit 858 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Cuneo (CN), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Canale, Castagnito, Magliano Alfieri, Priocca und Vezza d'Al

Castellino Tanaro
Castellino Tanaro ist eine Gemeinde mit 339 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Cuneo (CN), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Ceva, Igliano, Lesegno, Marsaglia, Niella Tanaro, italienischen Provinz Asti (AT), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Asti, Cerro Tanaro, Quattordio, Refrancore, Rocca d'Araz

Castelmagno
Castelmagno ist eine Gemeinde mit 117 Einwohnern (Stand: 2004) in der italienischen Provinz Cuneo (CN), Region Piemont. Die Gemeinde besteht aus den Ortsteilen Campomolino, Chiappi, Chiotti und Colletto. Nachbargemeinden sind Celle di Macra, Demonte, Dronero,

Caustics
Caustics sind ein Lichtbündelungsphänomen. Sie sind in der Natur überall dort zu beobachten, wo das Licht auf durchsichtige Stoffe oder Körper trifft, die in der Lage sind, Licht zu bündeln. Moderne Renderprogramme sind in der Lage, Caustics zu simulieren. siehe auch: Kaustik (Optik) Kategorie:Atmosphärische Optik italienischen Provinz Asti (AT), Region Piemont. Nachbargemeinden sind Bergamasco, Bruno, Incisa Scapaccino, Mombaruzzo und

Read More...

Little People

History

Likenesses

Dwarfism

Problems faced by people with these conditions

Diagnosis

Medical treatment

Terminology

Dwarfism and extreme shortness in popular culture and the arts

Famous people with dwarfism

See Also

External links

List of toy brands

Action figures

Board games

Major Board Game brands

Popular Games

Die-Cast toys

Dolls

Educational

General brands/toy companies

Model toys

Sports toys

Video games

Fisher-Price

History

Caucasian race

History of the concept

U.S. Supreme Court rulings

Current views

See also

Books

Dog

Terminology

Physical characteristics

Intelligence

Diet

Dangerous substances

Reproduction

Fertility

Menarche

Pregnancy and litters

Spaying and neutering

Attributes

Sight

Hearing

Scenting

Direction and spatial sense

Weather detection

Diseases and ailments

Diseases

Parasites

Common Physical Disorders

Behaviour

Interactions between Dogs and Humans

Treats

Dogs as working partners

Dogs as hunting and sporting partners

Dogs as pets

Dogs as food

Attacks on humans and livestock

Abandoned Dogs

Ancestry and history of domestication

Wolf ancestors

Speed of domestication

Dog breeds

Neoteny in the rapid evolution of diverse dog breeds

See also

References and further reading

References

External links

1970s

Worldwide trends in the Seventies

Economy of the Seventies

Oil crisis

Social movements

Environmentalism

Feminism

Gay rights

Culture during the Seventies