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African History

Africa's history has gone through a variety of stages; it is considered by many to be the place of origin for all human life, was brutally taken over in the 'Scramble for Africa' by many European countries interested in exploiting the continent's resources, and is now, on the whole, very poor and one of the least developed areas in the world.

Ancient Egypt

The Ancient Egyptians were one of the world's first great civilisations. It was based upon the Nile almost entirely, its floodplains providing arable land.

Geography of Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt was divided into the 'Black Land' and the 'Red Land'. The Black Land was the fertile area on the banks of the Nile - most Egyptian cities and towns were located around here. The Red Land was the desolate areas in the deserts. Interestingly, the two main subdivisions - Upper and Lower Egypt - are misaligned with modern geography. This is due to the orientation of the Nile.

Religion

Ancient Egyptian religion, aside for a brief period during the reign of pharaoh Akhenaten, was polytheistic; that is, having many gods and goddesses. Some of the most important gods and goddesses were:

• Ra, the Sun god
• Geb, the god of vegetation
• Isis, the goddess of fertility and love
• Nephthys, the goddess of divine assistance
• Nut, the goddess of the sky
• Osiris, the god of death
• Seth, the god of evil
• Shu, the god of wind
• Tefnut, the goddess of rain

Language

The Ancient Egyptians used a linguistic system known as hieroglyphics. Over 2000 distinct hieroglyphs are known. Vowels were rarely written except in occasions of possible ambiguity. The writing became known to archaeologists through work on the Rosetta Stone.

Slavery

From the 16th century onwards, many Africans were taken forcibly from their tribal homes to West African ports to be sold as slaves. For many, the journey to the ports was long and difficult and they were often sold and bought along the way. When they arrived at the ports they were taken in large slave ships. They were eventually taken to places such as America, the Caribbean and South America. Eventually, over 12,000,000 were taken away, forming the basis of African-American and Afro-Caribbean communities. The slavery stopped almost altogether towards the end of the 19th century.However, small amounts of unregulated slavery occur in some parts of Africa.

Scramble for Africa

One of the first countries to be taken over by Europeans in the Scramble for Africa was Egypt, by an Albanian officer called Mohammed Ali. He later took over Sudan. The French later took charge of Algeria, eventually taking over much of Western Africa - indeed, many West African countries retain French as an official language. The British also took large chunks. Portugal took lots of Southern Africa. In the end few African countries remained independent however economic, transport and supply infrastructures grew rapidly.

Modern Africa

The 1950s through to the 1980s marked the independence of many African countries from European rule. However, as militaries developed in African states many military coups occurred, including those of Idi Amin in Uganda and of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.

Arab Spring

Please see the article on the Arab Spring.

Shostakovich

Dimitri Shostakovich (born St. Petersburg, 1906, died Moscow, 1975), also spelt Dmitri Shostakovich, was a Russian composer. Though he is now honoured as one of the best Russian composers of his time, during his lifetime the Communist government criticized his work which many consider to have stifled his creative talents.

Life

Shostakovich was born in St. Petersburg in 1906. He studied at the Petrograd Conservatory during his teenage years, whence he graduated upon completion of his first symphony, which brought him to international attention. He then wrote his two operas and some more symphonies. During WWII he was evacuated with his family but soon moved to Moscow, where he taught music, though after some controversial works all of his compositions were banned. He then composed some film scores simply to make ends meet and was publicly forced to repent. In 1960 he joined the Communist party. From then on illnesses plagued him; a debilitating condition forced him to stop playing the piano, in 1965 he was diagnosed with polio and he died in 1975 from lung cancer in Moscow. Nevertheless, his legacy remains and his works are still played today.

Works

His best known works are his fifteen symphonies. The seventh is especially notable - it is known as the 'Leningrad' symphony as it was composed partly in Leningrad (now known as St. Petersburg) during the famous 900-day siege of World War Two. These contain a heavy patriotic theme. Other works include concertos for a variety of musical instruments and a major set of pieces for the string quartet, though his preferred instrument was the piano, which he composed a large amount of music for. He wrote ballets, songs and scores for films in an attempt to stop his works from being banned. He wrote the operas Katerina Ismailova and The Nose also.

Relationship with the Communist government

The communist government of the Soviet Union overthrew the tsardom in 1917, when Shostakovich was still a young boy. When he started composing it had become very powerful already and his works were made to conform with the regime. This is illustrated by the political themes of his symphonies. His aforementioned opera, Katerina Ismailova, was originally called Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District though the name was changed to get him out of political trouble. In 1948 he was forced to publicly repent, though the restrictions on music were relaxed in the mid-1950s.

Soil Mechanics

Soil mechanics is defined by Terzaghi (1948) as 'the application of laws of mechanics and hydraulics to engineering problems dealing with sediments and other unconsolidated accumulations of solid particles produced by the mechanical and chemical disintegration of rocks regardless of whether or not they contain an admixture of organic constituent.' This effectively means studying the way that forces and other laws of mechanics affect soils and sediments. To fully understand this, we must first understand what soil is.