Levinson, Barry (b. April 6, 1942, Baltimore, Md., U.S.) U.S. film director. He worked as a comedy writer for Carol Burnett and Mel Brooks in the 1970s, then made his directorial debut with Diner (1982), the first of several movies set in his native city. He followed it with The Natural (1984), Young Sherlock Holmes (1985), Tin Men (1987), and Good Morn¬ ing, Vietnam (1987). Noted for his directorial versatility, ranging from drama and crime stories to political satire, he also created the highly popular Rain Man (1988, Academy Award), Avalon (1990), Bugsy (1991), Sleepers (1996), Wag the Dog (1997), and The Perfect Storm (2000).
levirate and sororate \ , le-vo-r3t... , s6r-3-r3t\ Customs or laws regu¬ lating marriage following the death of a spouse, or in some cases during
the lifetime of the spouse. The levirate decrees a dead man’s brother to be the widow’s preferred marriage partner. In ancient Hebrew society, this practice served to perpetuate the line of a man who died childless. Often, the brother who marries his sister-in-law is a proxy for the deceased and no new marriage is contracted, since all progeny are acknowledged as the seed of the dead man. The sororate decrees the marriage of a man to his deceased wife’s sister or, under so-called sororal polygyny, to the wife’s younger sisters as they come of age. The latter was practiced by some American Indian tribes in the 19th century and continues among the Aus¬ tralian Aborigines.
Leviticus Rabbah \li-'vi-ti-k3s-ra-'ba\ (c. ad 450) Compilation of 37 compositions on topics suggested by the Old Testament Book of Leviti¬ cus. Their message is that the laws of history focus on the holy life of Israel (the Jewish people). If the Jews obey the laws of society aimed at Israel’s sanctification, then the foreordained history will unfold as Israel hopes. Israel, for its part, can affect its own destiny. Thus salvation at the end of history depends on sanctification in the here and now.
Levitt, Helen (b. Aug. 31, 1913, New York, N.Y., U.S.) U.S. photog- rapher. She began her career in photography at age 18. Her first show, “Photographs of Children,” was held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1943. It featured the subject matter—children, especially the underprivileged—and humanity that characterize much of her work. In the mid 1940s Levitt collaborated with the novelist James Agee, filmmaker Sidney Meyers, and painter Janice Loeb on The Quiet One, a prizewin¬ ning documentary about a young African American boy. For most of the 1960s she concentrated on film editing and directing. Levitt resumed her pursuit of photography in the 1970s.
Levittown Extensive suburban housing development in Hempstead, Long Island, N.Y. Developed 1946-51 by the firm of Levitt and Sons, Inc., it was an early example of a completely preplanned and mass- produced housing complex. It contained thousands of low-cost homes (with accompanying shopping centers, playgrounds, swimming pools, community halls, and schools). Levitt repeated the formula in Bucks County, Pa. (1951-55). The name Levittown became equated with simi¬ lar developments built across the country in the postwar building boom. Though once widely deplored, his towns differ from other, usually monotonous, middle-class speculative developments in their meandering roads and lush plantings.
levodopa or L-dopa Organic compound (L-3,4-dihydroxyphenylala- nine) from which the body makes dopamine, a neurotransmitter deficient in persons with parkinsonism. When given orally in large daily doses, levodopa can lessen the effects of the disease. However, it becomes less effective over time and causes abnormal involuntary movements (dyski¬ nesia).
levulose See fructose
Lewes Vlii-9s\ Town (pop., 1998 est.: 14,900), Lewes district, adminis¬ trative county of East Sussex, historic county of Sussex, England. It lies on the River Ouse 6 mi (10 km) north of the English Channel. In 1264 Simon de Montfort vanquished Henry III at the Battle of Lewes. Historic sites include the ruins of an 11th-century castle and the 16th-century Bar¬ bican House (home of Anne of Cleves). An administrative centre, Lewes has some light industry. Glyndebourne, a renowned opera centre, is nearby.
Lewin, Kurt (b. Sept. 9, 1890, Mogilno, Ger.—d. Feb. 12, 1947, New- tonville. Mass., U.S.) German-U.S. social psychologist. After training and teaching in Berlin, he immigrated to the U.S., where he taught at the Uni¬ versity of Iowa (1935—45) and later became director of a group dynam¬ ics research centre at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1945- 47). He is best known for his field theory of behaviour, which holds that human behaviour is a function of an individual’s psychological environ¬ ment. To fully understand and predict human behaviour, according to Lewin, one must view the totality of events in a person’s psychological field, or “lifespace.” His works include A Dynamic Theory of Personality (1935) and Field Theory in Social Science (1951).
Lewis, C(larence) l(rving) (b. April 12, 1883, Stoneham, Mass., U.S.—d. Feb. 3, 1964, Cambridge, Mass.) U.S. philosopher. He taught primarily at Harvard University (1920-53). His best-known works are Mind and the World Order (1929), Symbolic Logic (1932), An Analysis of Knowledge and Valuation (1947), and The Ground and Nature of the Right (1955). He maintained that knowledge is possible only where there
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is also a possibility of error. His position in epistemology represents a synthesis of empiricism and pragmatism.
Lewis, C(live) S(taples) (b. Nov. 29, 1898, Belfast, Ire.—d. Nov. 22, 1963, Oxford, Oxfordshire, Eng.) Irish-born British scholar and writer. Lewis taught first at Oxford (1925-54) and later at Cambridge (1954-63). An early volume, the critical Allegory of Love (1936) on medieval and Renaissance literature, is often considered his finest scholarly work. He became known in England and the U.S. for several series of BBC radio broadcasts during the war years on the subject of Christianity. Many of his books embrace Christian apologetics; the best known is The Screwtape Letters (1942), a satirical epistolary novel in which an experienced devil instructs his young charge in the art of temptation. Also well known are The Chronicles of Narnia (1950-56), a series of seven children’s stories (including The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe , 1950) that have become classics of fantasy; and a science-fiction trilogy, known mostly for its first volume, Out of the Silent Planet (1938).
Lewis, (Frederick) Carl(ton) (b. July 1, 1961, Birmingham, Ala., U.S.) U.S. track-and-field athlete. He qualified for the 1980 Olympics but did not participate, because of the U.S. boycott of the Moscow games. At the 1984 Olympics he won the 100-m and 200-m races, the long jump, and the 4 x 100-m relay. At the 1988 Olympics he won the long jump (becoming the first athlete ever to win that event consecutively) and the 100-m race and received a silver medal in the 200-m. In 1992 he again won the long jump and anchored the winning U.S. 4 x 100-m relay team, and in 1996 he astounded observers by winning a fourth consecutive long-jump title.
Lewis, David (Kellogg) (b. Sept. 28, 1941, Oberlin, Ohio, U.S.—d. Oct. 14, 2001, Princeton, N.J.) U.S. philosopher. He taught at the Uni¬ versity of California at Los Angeles from 1966 to 1970 and thereafter at Princeton University. A wide-ranging thinker, Lewis made important—in some cases groundbreaking—contributions to a number of fields. He was best known for his extreme realism regarding possible worlds; his defense of the IDENTITY THEORY in the PHILOSOPHY OF MIND (see also MIND-BODY PROBLEM); and his doctrine of “Humean supervenience” (named for the Enlighten¬ ment philosopher David Hume), according to which all truths about any possible world are determined by the distribution of properties attribut¬ able to specific points in space and time in that world (see supervenience). At the time of his death, he was widely considered the leading figure in ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY.