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120 I Assiniboine ► Astarte
were placed on reservations. Some 3,900 people claimed sole Assini- boin descent in the 2000 U.S. census.
There are somewhat fewer in Canada.
Assiniboine Vo-'sin-o-.bohA River River, southern Canada. Ris¬ ing in Saskatchewan, it flows south¬ east across Manitoba into the Red River of the North at Winnipeg. It is about 665 mi (1,070 km) long and has two tributaries, the Qu'Appelle and the Souris. Explored by Pierre La Verendrye in 1736, it later served as a route to the plains by colonists from Red River Settlement.
Assis, Joaquim Maria Machado de See Joaquim M.
Machado de Assis
assistance, writ of General search warrant used by the British in the American colonies. The warrants authorized customhouse officers, with the assistance of a sheriff, to search any house or ship for smuggled goods, without requiring them to specify the place or the goods. The legality of the writs was challenged by the colonists in the 1760s, and they became a major grievance in the years leading up to the American Revolution. See also James Otis.
assize \9-'siz\ In law, a session, or sitting, of a court. It originally referred to a judicial inquest in which a panel of men conducted an inves¬ tigation. It was later applied to special sessions of high courts in England and France. Assize courts were abolished in most countries in the 20th century, but in France they are still the courts of first instance in the han¬ dling of serious crimes.
Associated Press (AP) Cooperative news agency, the oldest and larg¬ est in the U.S. and long the largest in the world. Its beginnings trace to 1848, when six New York City newspapers pooled their efforts to finance a telegraphic relay of foreign news brought by ships to Boston. In 1892 the modern AP was set up under the laws of Illinois; several years later it moved to New York. Its restrictive controls on new memberships were ended with federal antitrust prosecution in the 1940s. AP was the first agency to devote a news wire to sports coverage (1946), and it distrib¬ utes business news through a partnership with Dow Jones & Co., Inc. More than 15,000 organizations worldwide obtain news, photographs, and illustrations from the agency. The AP Stylebook has become a standard in many journalistic organizations.
association In psychology, the process of forming mental connections or bonds between sensations, ideas, or memories. Though discussed by the ancient Greeks (in terms of similarities, contrasts, and contiguities), the “association of ideas” was first proposed by John Locke and subse¬ quently examined by David Hume, John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer, and William James. Ivan Pavlov used objective methods to study the phenom¬ enon, resulting in his identification of the conditioned reflex (see condi¬ tioning). Within psychoanalysis, the therapist encourages “free association” in order to help identify latent conflicts. Practitioners of Gestalt psychol¬ ogy and others have criticized associationist theories as too all-embracing, while some theorists of cognitive psychology have made it central to their theory of memory.
association football See football
Association of Caribbean States (ACS) Trading bloc composed of 25 countries of the Caribbean basin. Responding to a proposal by Pres. Bill Clinton for a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), existing Caribbean-area trading blocs joined forces in 1995 to strengthen their economic position and ease future integration into the FTAA. Prominent in the ACS are the Caricom countries (13 English-speaking countries and Suriname), which have been struggling toward a single market and economy along the lines of the European Union. The ACS has addressed such issues as unifying responses to natural disasters, ending the U.S. embargo of Cuba, and ending shipments of nuclear materials through the Panama Canal.
Association of Southeast Asian Nations See ASEAN
associative law Two closely related laws of number operations. In symbols, they are stated: a + (b + c) = (a + b) + c, and a(bc ) = ( ab)c . Stated in words: The terms or factors may be associated in any way desired and the result will be the same. This holds for the numbers generally encoun¬ tered: positive and negative, integral and fractional, rational and irrational, real and imaginary. Exceptions occur (e.g., in nonassociative algebras and divergent infinite series). See also commutative law, distributive law.
Assos See Assus
assumpsit \3-'s9mp-sit\ (Latin: “he has undertaken”) In common law, an action to recover damages for breach of contract, especially an implied or quasi contract. It developed in early English law as a form of recovery for the negligent performance of an undertaking (e.g., failing to protect from damage another’s goods in one’s care). Eventually, it came to cover broader claims regarding failure to keep a promise. It remains available as a contractual remedy in some U.S. jurisdictions.
Assus or Assos Ancient Greek city, southern Troas (now northwestern Turkey). It was founded in the 1st millennium bc on the Gulf of Edremit, opposite the island of Lesbos. It was long an important city and port. Aris¬ totle taught there 348-345 bc, and it was the birthplace of the philoso¬ pher Cleanthes (3317-232? bc).
Assyria Ancient empire, southwestern Asia. It grew from a small region around Ashur (in modem northern Iraq) to encompass an area stretching from Egypt to Anatolia. Assyria may have originated in the 2nd millen¬ nium bc, but it came to power gradually. Its greatest period began in the 9th century bc, when its conquests reached the Mediterranean Sea under Ashurnasirpal II (883-859), and again c. 746-609 bc, during the Neo- Assyrian empire, when it conquered much of the Middle East. Its great¬ est rulers during the latter period were Tiglath-pileser III, Sargon II, Sennacherib, and Ashurbanipal. Famous for their cruelty and fighting prow¬ ess, the Assyrians were also monumental builders, as shown by archaeo¬ logical finds at Nineveh, Ashur, and Calah. The opulence of Ashurbanipal’s court at Nineveh became legendary. Artistically, the Assyrians were par¬ ticularly noted for their stone bas-reliefs. The kingdom was finally van¬ quished in 612-609 bc by a coalition of Media and Babylonia (Chaldea).
Assyro-Babylonian language See Akkadian language
Astaire, Fred orig. Frederick Austerlitz (b. May 10, 1899, Omaha, Neb., U.S.—d. June 22,
1987, Los Angeles, Calif.) U.S. dancer and singer of stage and mov¬ ies. At age seven he began his popu¬ lar vaudeville dance act with his sister Adele, and they made their Broadway debut in 1917; they con¬ tinued dancing in stage hits until Adele retired in 1932. Astaire’s suc¬ cessful film appearances with Ginger Rogers began with Flying Down to Rio (1933) and continued until 1939.
In the 1940s and 1950s he danced on-screen with Eleanor Powell, Cyd Charisse, and Judy Garland. His singing, though untrained, was admired by the finest songwriters of his time. He retired in 1971 but occa¬ sionally appeared in films and on television. His combination of sophis¬ ticated, seemingly effortless grace and technical virtuosity revolutionized popular-dance performance.
Astana formerly (1992-98) Aqmola or Akmola \ak-'mo-b\ or(1961-92) Tselinograd Vtsi-'le-no-.graA City (pop., 1999: 319,318), capital of Kazakhstan. Situated on the banks of the Ishim River in north- central Kazakhstan, it was founded in 1824 as a Russian military outpost. The city’s importance was enhanced by its location at the junction of the Trans-Kazakhstan and South Siberian railways. It is in the centre of a mineral-rich steppe region. In 1994 the Kazakh government began to transfer the national capital from Almaty to Astana, changing the city’s name in 1998.
Astarte \a-'star-te\ or Ashtart \'ash-,tart\ Goddess of the ancient Middle East and chief deity of the Mediterranean seaports of Tyre, Sidon,