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Our Dumb World
''Our Dumb World'' is a parody of the standard desk atlas created by the staff of ''The Onion'' and published by Little, Brown and Company on October 30, 2007. It is The Onion's first book of entirely original content since 1999's '' Our Dumb Century''. The book, written in the satirical paper's editorial voice, contains entries for nearly every country on Earth, including detailed maps, feature articles, and humorous stereotyped descriptions of regional history and customs. For example, Romania's entry is subtitled, " Bram Stoker's Romania." There are eight distinct sections of the atlas. In order, North America, South America, Africa, Middle East, Europe, Asia, Oceania, and Extra. Included in the Extra section are the Northern and Southern Poles and Greenland, which is " larger than Africa and South America combined." The visual style of the book has been compared to Dorling Kindersley's Eyewitness series. The book uses faux xenophobia Xenophobia () is the fear or disl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Onion
''The Onion'' is an American digital media company and newspaper organization that publishes satirical articles on international, national, and local news. The company is based in Chicago but originated as a weekly print publication on August 29, 1988 in Madison, Wisconsin. ''The Onion'' began publishing online in early 1996. In 2007, they began publishing satirical news audio and video online as the ''Onion News Network''. In 2013, ''The Onion'' ceased publishing its print edition and launched Onion Labs, an advertising agency. ''The Onion''s articles cover current events, both real and fictional, parodying the tone and format of traditional news organizations with stories, editorials, and man-on-the-street interviews using a traditional news website layout and an editorial voice modeled after that of the Associated Press. The publication's humor often depends on presenting mundane, everyday events as newsworthy, surreal, or alarming, such as "Rotation Of Earth Plunges Entire N ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area of , about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8.7% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which has long been home to the majority of the human population, was the site of many of the first civilizations. Its 4.7 billion people constitute roughly 60% of the world's population. In general terms, Asia is bounded on the east by the Pacific Ocean, on the south by the Indian Ocean, and on the north by the Arctic Ocean. The border of Asia with Europe is a historical and cultural construct, as there is no clear physical and geographical separation between them. It is somewhat arbitrary and has moved since its first conception in classical antiquity. The division of Eurasia into two continents reflects East–West cultural, linguistic, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parody Books
A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satire, satiric or irony, ironic imitation. Often its subject is an original work or some aspect of it (theme/content, author, style, etc), but a parody can also be about a real-life person (e.g. a politician), event, or movement (e.g. the French Revolution or Counterculture of the 1960s, 1960s counterculture). Literary scholar Professor Simon Dentith defines parody as "any cultural practice which provides a relatively polemical allusive imitation of another cultural production or practice". The literary theorist Linda Hutcheon said "parody ... is imitation, not always at the expense of the parodied text." Parody may be found in art or culture, including literature, parody music, music, Theatre, theater, television and film, animation, and Video game, gaming. Some parody is practic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2007 Non-fiction Books
7 (seven) is the natural number following 6 and preceding 8. It is the only prime number preceding a cube. As an early prime number in the series of positive integers, the number seven has greatly symbolic associations in religion, mythology, superstition and philosophy. The seven Classical planets resulted in seven being the number of days in a week. It is often considered lucky in Western culture and is often seen as highly symbolic. Unlike Western culture, in Vietnamese culture, the number seven is sometimes considered unlucky. It is the first natural number whose pronunciation contains more than one syllable. Evolution of the Arabic digit In the beginning, Indians wrote 7 more or less in one stroke as a curve that looks like an uppercase vertically inverted. The western Ghubar Arabs' main contribution was to make the longer line diagonal rather than straight, though they showed some tendencies to making the digit more rectilinear. The eastern Arabs developed the digit f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Onion: An Interview With 'America's Finest News Source'
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with pronouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of pronoun ''thee'') when followed by a v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Google Earth
Google Earth is a computer program that renders a 3D computer graphics, 3D representation of Earth based primarily on satellite imagery. The program maps the Earth by superimposition, superimposing satellite images, aerial photography, and geographic information system, GIS data onto a 3D globe, allowing users to see cities and landscapes from various angles. Users can explore the globe by entering addresses and coordinates, or by using a Computer keyboard, keyboard or computer mouse, mouse. The program can also be downloaded on a smartphone or Tablet computer, tablet, using a touch screen or stylus to navigate. Users may use the program to add their own data using Keyhole Markup Language and upload them through various sources, such as forums or blogs. Google Earth is able to show various kinds of images overlaid on the surface of the earth and is also a Web Map Service client. In 2019, Google has revealed that Google Earth now covers more than 97 percent of the world, and has c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xenophobia
Xenophobia () is the fear or dislike of anything which is perceived as being foreign or strange. It is an expression of perceived conflict between an in-group and out-group and may manifest in suspicion by the one of the other's activities, a desire to eliminate their presence, and fear of losing national, ethnic, or racial identity.Guido Bolaffi. ''Dictionary of race, ethnicity and culture''. SAGE Publications Ltd., 2003. Pp. 332. Alternate definitions A 1997 review article on xenophobia holds that it is "an element of a political struggle about who has the right to be cared for by the state and society: a fight for the collective good of the modern state." According to Italian sociologist Guido Bolaffi, xenophobia can also be exhibited as an "''uncritical exaltation of another culture''" which is ascribed "''an unreal, stereotyped and exotic quality''". History Ancient Europe An early example of xenophobic sentiment in Western culture is the Ancient Greek denigratio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eyewitness Books
''Eyewitness Books'' (called ''Eyewitness Guides'' in the UK) is a series of educational nonfiction books. They were first published in Great Britain by Dorling Kindersley in 1988. The series now has over 160 titles on a variety of subjects, such as dinosaurs, Ancient Egypt, flags, chemistry, music, the solar system, film, and William Shakespeare. According to Dorling Kindersley, over 50 million copies have been sold in 36 languages. The books are often noted for their numerous photographs and detailed illustrations, which are always set against a white background. Describing the series in ''Booklist'', Michael Cart wrote, "What DK did—with almost revolutionary panache—was essentially to reinvent nonfiction books by breaking up the solid pages of gray type that had previously been their hallmark, reducing the text to bite-size, nonlinear nuggets that were then surrounded by pictures that did more than adorn—they also conveyed information. Usually full color, they were so crisp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorling Kindersley
Dorling Kindersley Limited (branded as DK) is a British multinational publishing company specialising in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 63 languages. It is part of Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of German media conglomerate Bertelsmann. Established in 1974, DK publishes a range of titles in genres including travel (including DK Eyewitness travel), history, geography, science, space, nature, sports, gardening, cookery and parenting. The worldwide co-CEOs of DK is Paul Kelly and Rebecca Smart. DK has offices in New York, Melbourne, London, Munich, New Delhi, Toronto, Madrid, Beijing, and Jiangmen. DK works with licensing partners such as Disney, LEGO, DC Comics, the Royal Horticultural Society, MasterChef, and the Smithsonian Institution. DK has commissioned Mary Berry, Monty Don, Robert Winston, Huw Richards, and Steve Mould for a range of books. History DK was founded in 1974 by Christopher Dorling and Peter Kindersley in London as a book ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mercator Projection
The Mercator projection () is a cylindrical map projection presented by Flemish geographer and cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569. It became the standard map projection for navigation because it is unique in representing north as up and south as down everywhere while preserving local directions and shapes. The map is thereby conformal. As a side effect, the Mercator projection inflates the size of objects away from the equator. This inflation is very small near the equator but accelerates with increasing latitude to become infinite at the poles. As a result, landmasses such as Greenland, Antarctica and Russia appear far larger than they actually are relative to landmasses near the equator, such as Central Africa. History There is some controversy over the origins of the Mercator. German polymath Erhard Etzlaub engraved miniature "compass maps" (about 10×8 cm) of Europe and parts of Africa that spanned latitudes 0°–67° to allow adjustment of his portable pocket-s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greenland
Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland is the world's largest island. It is one of three constituent countries that form the Kingdom of Denmark, along with Denmark and the Faroe Islands; the citizens of these countries are all citizens of Denmark and the European Union. Greenland's capital is Nuuk. Though a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe (specifically Norway and Denmark, the colonial powers) for more than a millennium, beginning in 986.The Fate of Greenland's Vikings , by Dale Mackenzie Brown, ''Archaeological Institute of America'', ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oceania
Oceania (, , ) is a region, geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern Hemisphere, Eastern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of and a population of around 44.5 million as of 2021. When compared with (and sometimes described as being one of) the continents, the region of Oceania is the smallest in land area and the list of continents and continental subregions by population, second least populated after Antarctica. Its major population centres are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Auckland, Adelaide, Honolulu, and Christchurch. Oceania has a diverse mix of economies from the developed country, highly developed and globally competitive market economy, financial markets of Australia, French Polynesia, Hawaii, Hawaii, New Caledonia, and New Zealand, which rank high in quality of life and Human Development Index, to the much least developed countries, less developed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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