Krishna One of the most widely venerated Hindu gods, worshiped as the eighth incarnation of Vishnu and as the supreme deity. Many BUishna legends are drawn from the Mahabharata and the Puranas. His earliest appearance is in the Mahabharata as the divine charioteer of Arjuna, whom Krishna convinces that the war Arjuna is about to fight is just (see Bhagavadgita). In later works Krishna was a slayer of demons, a secret lover of all devotees, and a devoted son and father. He also lifted the sacred hill of Govardhana on one finger to protect his devotees from Indra’s wrath. In art Krishna is often depicted with blue-black skin, wear¬ ing a loincloth and a crown of peacock feathers. As a divine lover, he is shown playing the flute, surrounded by adoring females.
Krishna River formerly Kistna River River, southern India. Rising in Maharashtra state, it flows southeast and east across Karnataka and crosses Andhra Pradesh state before entering the Bay of Bengal after a course of 800 mi (1,290 km).
Krishnamurti \,krish-n3- , mur-te\ / Jiddu (b. 1895—d. 1986) Indian spiritual leader. He was educated in theosophy by Annie Besant, who pro¬ claimed him the coming “World Teacher,” a messiah-like figure who would bring about world enlightenment. He became a teacher and writer, and from the 1920s he spent much time in the U.S. and Europe. He broke with formal theosophy in 1929 and renounced any claims to being a World Teacher, but he continued to be a popular lecturer. His desire, he said, was to set people free, a goal that could only be achieved through unflinching self-awareness. He established a number of Krishnamurti foundations in the U.S., Britain, and India to further his aims. His books include The Songs of Life (1931) and Commentaries on Living (1956-60).
Kristallnacht \kres-'tal-,nakt\ or Crystal Night or Night of Bro¬ ken Glass Night of violence against Jews, carried out by members of the German Nazi Party on Nov. 9-10, 1938, so called because of the bro¬ ken glass left in its aftermath. The violence, instigated by Joseph Goeb- bels, left 91 Jews dead and hundreds seriously injured. About 7,500 Jewish businesses were gutted and some 1,000 synagogues burned or damaged. The Gestapo arrested 30,000 Jewish males, offering to release them only if they emigrated and surrendered their wealth. The incident marked a major escalation in the Nazi program of Jewish persecution, foreshadow¬ ing the Holocaust.
Kristeva \kre-sta-'va,\ English \kri-'sta-V3\, Julia (b. June 24, 1941, Sliven, Bulg.) Bulgarian-born French psychoanalyst, critic, and educator. Professor of linguistics at the University of Paris VII, she is known for her writings in structuralist linguistics (see structuralism), psychoanalysis, semiotics, and feminism. She was a protege of Roland Barthes, and she synthesized elements from such thinkers as Jacques Lacan, Michel Fou¬ cault, and Mikhail Bakhtin in creating her own theories. Her novels include The Samurai (1990) and The Old Man and the Wolves (1991).
Kritios See Critius and Nesiotes Krivoy Rog See Kryvyy Rih
Kroc, Ray(mond Albert) (b. Oct. 5, 1902, Chicago, Ill., U.S.—d. Jan. 14, 1984, San Diego, Calif.) U.S. restaurateur, a pioneer of the fast- food industry. He was working as a blender salesman when he discovered a restaurant in San Bernardino, Calif., owned by Maurice and Richard McDonald, who used an assembly-line format to prepare and sell a large volume of hamburgers, french fries, and milk shakes. Beginning in 1955 Kroc opened his first McDonald’s drive-in restaurant in Des Plaines, Ill., paying the brothers a percentage of the receipts. He soon began selling
franchises for new restaurants, and he instituted a training program for owner-managers that emphasized automation and standardization. At the time of his death there were some 7,500 McDonald’s restaurants worldwide; with more than 25,000 restaurants in the early 21st century,
McDonald’s was the world’s largest food-service retailer.
Kroeber Vkro-borN, A(lfred)
L(ouis) (b. June 11, 1876, Hoboken,
N.J., U.S.—d. Oct. 5, 1960, Paris,
Fr.) U.S. anthropologist. Trained under Franz Boas (Ph.D., 1901), he later taught at the University of Cali¬ fornia at Berkeley. Kroeber’s career nearly coincided with the emergence of academic, professionalized anthro¬ pology in the U.S. and contributed significantly to its development. He made valuable contributions to American Indian ethnology, New World archaeology, and the study of linguistics, folklore, kinship, and culture. His most influential books are considered to be Anthropology (1923) and The Nature of Culture (1952). His daughter, Ursula K. Le Guin (b. 1929), was a noted science fiction and fantasy writer.
Kroemer, Herbert (b. Aug. 25, 1928, Weimar, Ger.) German physi¬ cist. He received a Ph.D. (1952) from Georg August University in Got¬ tingen and later moved to the U.S., where he taught at several institutions. In 1957 he carried out theoretical calculations showing that a heterostruc¬ ture transistor, which is made from several materials, would be superior to a conventional transistor, which is made from only one kind of mate¬ rial. His theory was later confirmed and led to the development of numer¬ ous electronic components that had a significant influence on communications technology and computers. He shared the 2000 Nobel Prize for Physics with Zhores Alferov and Jack S. Kilby.
Kronos See Cronus
Kronshtadt \'kron-,shtat\ Rebellion (1921) Internal uprising against Soviet rule in Russia after the Russian Civil War, conducted by sailors from the Kronshtadt naval base. The sailors had supported the Bolsheviks in the Russian Revolution of 1917, but disillusionment with the government and inadequate food supplies after the civil war led them to demand economic and labour reform and political freedoms. The rebels were crushed by a force led by Leon Trotsky and Mikhayl Tukhachevsky, and the survivors were shot or imprisoned. By dramatically demonstrating popular dissatisfac¬ tion with communist policies, the rebellion, along with several other major internal uprisings, led to the adoption of the New Economic Policy.
Kronstadt See Brasov
Kropotkin Vkro-'pot-ksnV Peter (Alekseyevich) (b. Dec. 21,
1842, Moscow, Russia—d. Feb. 8,
1921, Dmitrov, near Moscow) Rus¬ sian revolutionary and geographer, foremost theorist of anarchism. The son of a prince, he renounced his aristocratic heritage in 1871.
Although he achieved renown in such fields as geography, zoology, sociology, and history, he shunned material success for the life of a revolutionist. He was imprisoned on political charges (1874-76) but escaped and fled to western Europe.
He was imprisoned in France on trumped-up charges of sedition (1883—86), and in 1886 he settled in England, where he remained until the Russian Revolution of 1917 allowed him to return home. While
Ray Kroc
SYGMA
Peter Alekseyevich Kropotkin.
BROWN BROTHERS
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Kru ► Kuala Lumpur I 1055
in exile, he wrote several influential books, including Memoirs of a Revo¬ lutionist (1899) and Mutual Aid (1902), in which he attempted to put anarchism on a scientific basis and argued that cooperation rather than conflict is the chief factor in the evolution of species. On his return to Russia, he was bitterly disappointed that the Bolsheviks had made their revolution by authoritarian rather than libertarian methods, and he retired from politics.
Kru Group of peoples of Liberia and Cote d’Ivoire, including the Bassa, Krahn, Grebo, Klao (Kru), Bakwe, and Bete. They speak Kru languages of the Niger-Congo family and number some 2.5 million. Members of Kru ethnic groups, especially Klao, Grebo, and Bassa, are known as ste¬ vedores and fishermen all along the west coast of Africa and have estab¬ lished colonies in most ports from Dakar, Seneg., to Douala, Camer., the largest being in Monrovia, Liberia.