Shawn, Ted orig. Edwin Myers Shawn (b. Oct. 21, 1891, Kan¬ sas City, Mo., U.S.—d. Jan. 9, 1972, Orlando, Fla.) U.S. modem dancer, teacher, and choreographer. He married Ruth St. Denis in 1914, soon after beginning his dance career. In 1915 they cofounded the Denishawn school
George Bernard Shaw, photograph by Yousuf Karsh.
KARSH/WOODFIN CAMP AND ASSOCIATES
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Shawnee ► sheep I 1735
and company to promote nonballetic dance movement; their tours brought modern dance to many parts of the U.S. for the first time. After the couple separated in 1931, the com¬ pany disbanded, and Shawn estab¬ lished a company of male dancers for which he choreographed works that embodied a vigorous, masculine style. In 1933 he founded the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in Becket,
Mass., as a summer residence and theatre for his dancers. He continued to dance and choreograph into the 1960s.
Shawnee \sho-'ne\ Algonquian- speaking North American Indian people from the central Ohio River valley. (See Algonquian languages.) Closely related in language and culture to the Fox, Kickapoo, and Sauk, the Shawnee were also influenced by the Seneca and Delaware. In the summer the Shawnee lived in bark-covered houses grouped into large villages near cornfields. Women farmed, and the pri¬ mary male occupation was hunting. In winter the village broke into small patrilineal family groups, which moved to hunting camps. In the 17th cen¬ tury the Shawnee were driven from their home by the Iroquois, scattering into widely separated areas. After 1725 the Shawnee reunited in Ohio. Fol¬ lowing their defeat by Gen. Anthony Wayne (1794), they broke into three independent branches that eventually settled in Oklahoma. Today some 11,000 people claim Shawnee ancestry. See also Tecumseh.
shaykh See sheikh
Shays's Rebellion (1786-87) Uprising in western Massachusetts. In a period of economic depression and land seizures for debt collection, several hundred farmers led by Daniel Shays (17477-1825), who had served as a captain in the Revolutionary army, marched on the state supreme court in Springfield, preventing it from carrying out foreclosures and debt collection. Shays then led about 1,200 men in an attack on the nearby federal arsenal, but they were repulsed by troops under Benjamin Lincoln. As a result of the uprising, the state enacted laws easing the eco¬ nomic condition of debtors.
Shcharansky \sho-'ran-ske\, Anatoly (Borisovich) or Natan Sharansky (b. Jan. 20, 1948, Stalino, Ukraine, U.S.S.R.) Soviet dissi¬ dent and Israeli politician. He studied mathematics and computer program¬ ming at the Moscow Physical-Technical Institute (1966-72) and then worked in Moscow as a computer specialist for the Institute of Oil and Gas. A Jew, he applied for permission to emigrate to Israel in 1973 but was refused and discharged from his job. With an excellent command of English, he became a spokesperson for the dissidents and refuseniks in con¬ tacting Western correspondents to publicize their cause. In 1977 he was arrested by the KGB for treason and espionage, sentenced to 13 years in prison, and sent to the Siberian Gulag. His wife, Avital, who had emigrated to Israel in 1974, championed his cause. Released in 1986, he settled in Israel, where he founded a party stressing the concerns of Russian immi¬ grants, and he was appointed to the cabinet as minister of industry and trade in 1996. He later served as interior minister in Ehud Barak’s government and as housing and construction minister in Ariel Sharon’s government.
She-Chi See She-Ji
She-Ji Vsho-'jeV or She-Chi Ancient Chinese compound deity of the soil and harvests. China’s earliest legendary emperors worshiped She (earth), for they alone had responsibility for the entire earth and country. Since ordinary people had no part in this courtly worship, they came to focus their worship on the god of grain (Ji). Local shrines held two images, one of She and one of Ji, and eventually the two images were considered man and wife.
shear legs Device, often temporary, for lifting heavy weights. It con¬ sisted of three poles lashed together at the top with a block and tackle attached. Shear legs were often used for placing masts in sailing ships.
shear wall In building construction, a rigid vertical diaphragm capable of transferring lateral forces from exterior walls, floors, and roofs to the ground foundation in a direction parallel to their planes. Examples are the reinforced-concrete wall or vertical truss. Lateral forces caused by wind, earthquake, and uneven settlement loads, in addition to the weight of
structure and occupants, create powerful twisting (torsional) forces. These forces can literally tear (shear) a building apart. Reinforcing a frame by attaching or placing a rigid wall inside it maintains the shape of the frame and prevents rotation at the joints. Shear walls are especially important in high-rise buildings subject to lateral wind and seismic forces.
shearing In textile manufacturing, the cutting of the raised nap of a pile fabric to a uniform height to enhance appearance. Shearing machines operate much like rotary lawn mowers, and the amount of shearing depends on the desired height of the nap or pile. Shearing may also be applied to create stripes and other patterns by varying surface height. In animal husbandry, shearing is the cutting off of the fleece of sheep and other wool-bearing animals, using special shears.
shearwater Any of numerous species (family Procellariidae) of long¬ winged seabirds named for their habit of gliding on stiff wings along wave troughs. Typical shearwaters are the 12-17 drab, slender-billed species of Puffinus, 14-26 in. (35-65 cm) long. Shearwaters nest in a burrow on off¬ shore islands and coastal hills in the Atlantic and Mediterranean and throughout most of the Pacific. A colony may consist of hundreds of thousands of pairs; at night, when the calling adults move in and out of the burrows, the din is deafening. See also fulmar, petrel.
sheathed bacteria Group of bacteria found widely in nature in slow- running water. Many species are attached to underwater surfaces. They are characterized by a threadlike, branching arrangement of cells enclosed in a sheath. The sheaths of some are variously encrusted with iron or manganese oxides, depending on the water. One of the best-known is a common species, Sphaerotilus natans\ in polluted water it has thin, colourless sheaths, and in unpolluted water containing iron it has yellow- brown, iron-encrusted sheaths that often grow into long slimy tassels.
Sheba, Queen of (fl. 10th century bc) In Jewish and Islamic tradi¬ tions, ruler of the Kingdom of Saba 5 (Sheba) in southwestern Arabia. In an Old Testament story, she visited King Solomon to test his wisdom. In Islamic tradition she is known as Bilqls and is converted from worship of the sun to worship of God, marrying either Solomon himself or a Ham- danl tribesman. In Persian folklore she is considered the daughter of a Chinese king and a peri (a type of supernatural being). Ethiopian tradi¬ tion names her Makeda; her son by Solomon is seen as the founder of the Ethiopian royal dynasty.
Shebele River See Shabeelle River
Shebeli \sho-ba'-le\ River Somali Shabeelle \sha-'be-le\ River River, eastern Africa. It rises in the Ethiopian Highlands and flows south¬ east through the arid Ogaden Plateau. After crossing into Somalia, it approaches the coast near Mogadishu, then turns southwest to flow par¬ allel with the coast. Its total length is about 1,130 mi (1,820 km). During rainy periods in Ethiopia, it joins the Jubba River, and the combined waters then flow to the Indian Ocean. In drier years it disappears in a series of marshes and sand flats northeast of the Jubba confluence.
Sheeler, Charles (b. July 16, 1883, Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.—d. May 7, 1965, Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.) U.S. painter and photographer. Educated at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, he initially earned a living as a photographer. His acclaimed series of photographs of the Ford auto¬ mobile plant at River Rouge, Mich. (1927), was followed by a series on Chartres Cathedral (1929). In his paintings, early Cubist influences led to the Precisionism of his maturity. He treated industrial and architectural subjects in an abstract-realist style, emphasizing their formal qualities, as in his painting Rolling Power (1939), which revealed the abstract power of a locomotive’s driving wheels.