1.
Spanish naming customs
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Spanish naming customs are historical traditions for naming children practised in Spain. According to these customs, a persons name consists of a name followed by two family names. The first surname is usually the fathers first surname, and the second the mothers first surname, in recent years, the order of the surnames can be reversed at birth if it is so decided by the parents. Currently in Spain, people bear a single or composite given name, a composite given name comprises two single names, for example Juan Pablo is considered not to be a first and a second forename, but a single composite forename. The two surnames refer to each of the parental families, traditionally, a persons first surname is the fathers first surname, and the second one is the mothers first surname. From 2013, if the parents of a child are unable to agree on order of surnames, the law also grants a person the option, upon reaching adulthood, of reversing the order of their surnames. Each surname can also be composite, the parts usually linked by the y or e. For example, a name might be Juan Pablo Fernández de Calderón García-Iglesias, consisting of a forename, a paternal surname. There are times when it is impossible, by inspection of a name, for example, the writer Sebastià Juan Arbó was alphabetised by the Library of Congress for many years under Arbó, assuming that Sebastiá and Juan were both given names. However, Juan was actually his first surname, to resolve questions like this, which typically involve very common names, one must consult the person involved, or legal documents. A man named José Antonio Gómez Iglesias would normally be addressed as either señor Gómez or señor Gómez Iglesias instead of señor Iglesias, because Gómez is his first surname. Furthermore, Mr. Gómez might be addressed as José Antonio, José, Pepe, Antonio, or Toño Jose, Joselito, Josito, Joselillo, Josico or Joselín, Antoñito, Tonín or Nono. Very formally, he could be addressed with an honorific as don José Antonio or don José, colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez is sometimes incorrectly referred to in English media as Mr. Márquez, when it should be Mr. García Márquez or, simply, Mr. García. It is not unusual, when the first surname is very common, for example, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is often called simply Zapatero, the name he inherited from his mothers family, since Rodríguez is a common surname and may be ambiguous. The same occurs with another former Spanish Socialist leader, Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, with the poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca, as these peoples paternal names are very common, they are often called with their maternal names. It would nonetheless be a mistake to index José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero under Z as Zapatero, a practical option to spare an explanation is using a single surname composed of two separate words. Parents choose their childs name, which must be recorded in the Registro Civil to establish his or her legal identity. With few restrictions, parents can now choose any name, common sources of names are the parents taste, honouring a relative, the General Roman Calendar nomina, legislation in Spain under Franco legally limited cultural naming customs to only Christian and typical Spanish names
2.
Barcelona
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Founded as a Roman city, in the Middle Ages Barcelona became the capital of the County of Barcelona. Barcelona has a cultural heritage and is today an important cultural centre. Particularly renowned are the works of Antoni Gaudí and Lluís Domènech i Montaner. The headquarters of the Union for the Mediterranean is located in Barcelona, the city is known for hosting the 1992 Summer Olympics as well as world-class conferences and expositions and also many international sport tournaments. It is a cultural and economic centre in southwestern Europe, 24th in the world. In 2008 it was the fourth most economically powerful city by GDP in the European Union, in 2012 Barcelona had a GDP of $170 billion, it is leading Spain in both employment rate and GDP per capita change. In 2009 the city was ranked Europes third and one of the worlds most successful as a city brand, since 2011 Barcelona has been a leading smart city in Europe. During the Middle Ages, the city was known as Barchinona, Barçalona, Barchelonaa. Internationally, Barcelonas name is abbreviated to Barça. However, this refers only to FC Barcelona, the football club. The common abbreviated form used by locals is Barna, another common abbreviation is BCN, which is also the IATA airport code of the Barcelona-El Prat Airport. The city is referred to as the Ciutat Comtal in Catalan. The origin of the earliest settlement at the site of present-day Barcelona is unclear, the ruins of an early settlement have been excavated in the El Raval neighbourhood, including different tombs and dwellings dating to earlier than 5000 BC. The founding of Barcelona is the subject of two different legends, the first attributes the founding of the city to the mythological Hercules. In about 15 BC, the Romans redrew the town as a castrum centred on the Mons Taber, under the Romans, it was a colony with the surname of Faventia, or, in full, Colonia Faventia Julia Augusta Pia Barcino or Colonia Julia Augusta Faventia Paterna Barcino. It enjoyed immunity from imperial burdens, the city minted its own coins, some from the era of Galba survive. Some remaining fragments of the Roman walls have incorporated into the cathedral. The cathedral, also known as the Basilica La Seu, is said to have founded in 343
3.
Marrakesh
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Marrakesh, also known by the French spelling Marrakech, is a major city of the Kingdom of Morocco. It is the fourth largest city in the country, after Casablanca, Fes and it is the capital city of the mid-southwestern region of Marrakesh-Safi. Marrakesh is possibly the most important of Moroccos four former imperial cities, the region has been inhabited by Berber farmers since Neolithic times, but the actual city was founded in 1062 by Abu Bakr ibn Umar, chieftain and cousin of Almoravid king Yusuf ibn Tashfin. In the 12th century, the Almoravids built many madrasas and mosques in Marrakesh that bear Andalusian influences. The red walls of the city, built by Ali ibn Yusuf in 1122–1123, Marrakesh grew rapidly and established itself as a cultural, religious, and trading centre for the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa, Jemaa el-Fnaa is the busiest square in Africa. After a period of decline, the city was surpassed by Fes, beginning in the 17th century, the city became popular among Sufi pilgrims for Moroccos seven patron saints, who are entombed here. In 2009, Marrakesh mayor Fatima Zahra Mansouri became the woman to be elected mayor in Morocco. Like many Moroccan cities, Marrakesh comprises an old fortified city packed with vendors and their stalls, bordered by modern neighborhoods, today it is one of the busiest cities in Africa and serves as a major economic centre and tourist destination. Tourism is strongly advocated by the reigning Moroccan monarch, Mohammed VI, despite the economic recession, real estate and hotel development in Marrakesh has grown dramatically in the 21st century. Marrakesh is particularly popular with the French, and numerous French celebrities own property in the city, Marrakesh has the largest traditional market in Morocco, with some 18 souks selling wares ranging from traditional Berber carpets to modern consumer electronics. Crafts employ a significant percentage of the population, who sell their products to tourists. Marrakesh is one of North Africa’s largest centres of wildlife trade, much of this trade can be found in the medina and adjacent squares. Tortoises are particularly popular for sale as pets but Barbary macaques and snakes can also be seen, Marrakesh is served by Ménara International Airport and the Marrakesh railway station, which connects the city to Casablanca and northern Morocco. Marrakesh has several universities and schools, including Cadi Ayyad University, a number of Moroccan football clubs are located here, including Najm de Marrakech, KAC Marrakech, Mouloudia de Marrakech and Chez Ali Club de Marrakech. The Marrakesh Street Circuit hosts the World Touring Car Championship, Auto GP, the exact meaning of the name is debated. The probable origin of the name Marrakesh is from the Berber words amur akush, the word mur is used now in Berber mostly in the feminine form tamurt. The common English spelling is Marrakesh, although Marrakech is also widely used, the name is spelled Mṛṛakc in the Berber Latin alphabet, Marraquexe in Portuguese, Marraquech in Spanish, and Mer-reksh in Moroccan Arabic. From medieval times until around the beginning of the 20th century, the name for Morocco is still Marrakesh to this day in Persian and Urdu as well as many other South Asian languages
4.
Morocco
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Morocco, officially known as the Kingdom of Morocco, is a sovereign country located in the Maghreb region of North Africa. Geographically, Morocco is characterized by a mountainous interior, large tracts of desert. Morocco has a population of over 33.8 million and an area of 446,550 km2 and its capital is Rabat, and the largest city is Casablanca. Other major cities include Marrakesh, Tangier, Tetouan, Salé, Fes, Agadir, Meknes, Oujda, Kenitra, a historically prominent regional power, Morocco has a history of independence not shared by its neighbours. Marinid and Saadi dynasties continued the struggle against foreign domination, the Alaouite dynasty, the current ruling dynasty, seized power in 1666. In 1912 Morocco was divided into French and Spanish protectorates, with a zone in Tangier. Moroccan culture is a blend of Arab, indigenous Berber, Sub-Saharan African, Morocco claims the non-self-governing territory of Western Sahara as its Southern Provinces. Morocco annexed the territory in 1975, leading to a war with indigenous forces until a cease-fire in 1991. Peace processes have thus far failed to break the political deadlock, Morocco is a constitutional monarchy with an elected parliament. The King of Morocco holds vast executive and legislative powers, especially over the military, foreign policy, the king can issue decrees called dahirs which have the force of law. He can also dissolve the parliament after consulting the Prime Minister, Moroccos predominant religion is Islam, and the official languages are Arabic and Tamazight. The Moroccan dialect, referred to as Darija, and French are also widely spoken, Morocco is a member of the Arab League, the Union for the Mediterranean, and the African Union. It has the fifth largest economy of Africa, the full Arabic name al-Mamlakah al-Maghribiyyah translates to Kingdom of the West, although the West in Arabic is الغرب Al-Gharb. The basis of Moroccos English name is Marrakesh, its capital under the Almoravid dynasty, the origin of the name Marrakesh is disputed, but is most likely from the Berber words amur akush or Land of God. The modern Berber name for Marrakesh is Mṛṛakc, in Turkish, Morocco is known as Fas, a name derived from its ancient capital of Fes. The English name Morocco is an anglicisation of the Spanish Marruecos, the area of present-day Morocco has been inhabited since Paleolithic times, sometime between 190,000 and 90,000 BC. During the Upper Paleolithic, the Maghreb was more fertile than it is today, twenty-two thousand years ago, the Aterian was succeeded by the Iberomaurusian culture, which shared similarities with Iberian cultures. Skeletal similarities have been suggested between the Iberomaurusian Mechta-Afalou burials and European Cro-Magnon remains, the Iberomaurusian was succeeded by the Beaker culture in Morocco
5.
Novelist
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A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, Novelists come from a variety of backgrounds and social classes, and frequently this shapes the content of their works. Similarly, some novelists have creative identities derived from their focus on different genres of fiction, such as crime, while many novelists compose fiction to satisfy personal desires, novelists and commentators often ascribe a particular social responsibility or role to novel writers. Many authors use such moral imperatives to justify different approaches to writing, including activism or different approaches to representing reality truthfully. Novelist is a derivative from the term novel describing the writer of novels. However, the OED attributes the primary meaning of a writer of novels as first appearing in the 1633 book East-India Colation by C. The difference between professional and amateur novelists often is the ability to publish. Many people take up writing as a hobby, but the difficulties of completing large scale fictional works of quality prevent the completion of novels. Once authors have completed a novel, they often try to get it published. The publishing industry requires novels to have accessible profitable markets, thus many novelists will self-publish to circumvent the editorial control of publishers, self-publishing has long been an option for writers, with vanity presses printing bound books for a fee paid by the writer. The rise of the Internet and electronic books has made self publishing far less expensive, Novelists apply a number of different methods to writing their novels, relying on a variety of approaches to inspire creativity. Some communities actively encourage amateurs to practice writing novels to develop these unique practices, for example, the internet-based group, National Novel Writing Month, encourages people to write 50, 000-word novels in the month of November, to give novelists practice completing such works. In the 2010 event, over 200,000 people took part – writing a total of over 2.8 billion words, Novelists dont usually publish their first novels until later in life. However, many novelists begin writing at a young age, for example, Iain Banks began writing at eleven, and at sixteen completed his first novel, The Hungarian Lift-Jet, about international arms dealers, in pencil in a larger-than-foolscap log book. However, he was thirty before he published his first novel, the success of this novel enabled Banks to become a full-time novelist. Occasionally, novelists publish as early as their teens, for example, Patrick OBrian published his first novel, Caesar, The Life Story of a Panda-Leopard, at the age of 15, which brought him considerable critical attention. Occasionally, these works will achieve popular success as well, for example, though Christopher Paolinis Eragon, was not a great critical success, but its popularity among readers placed it on the New York Times Childrens Books Best Seller list for 121 weeks. First-time novelists of any age often find themselves unable to get published, because of a number of reasons reflecting the inexperience of the author
6.
Spaniards
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Within Spain there are a number of nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the countrys complex history and diverse culture. There are several commonly spoken languages, most notably Basque. There are many populations outside Spain with ancestors who emigrated from Spain, the Roman Republic conquered Iberia during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC. As a result of Roman colonization, the majority of languages, with the exception of Basque. The Germanic Vandals and Suebi, with part of the Iranian Alans under King Respendial conquered the peninsula in 409 AD. The Iberian Peninsula was conquered and brought under the rule of the Arab Umayyads in 711 and by the Berber North African dynasties the Almohads, in the early 16th century the Kingdom of Navarre was also conquered. In parallel, a wave of emigration began to the Americas began with over 16 million people emigrating to the Americas during the colonial period. In the post-colonial period, a further 3.5 million Spanish left for the Americas, particularly Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, as a result, Spanish-descendants in Latin America number in the hundreds of millions. Spain is home to one of the largest communities of Romani people, the Spanish Roma, which belong to the Iberian Kale subgroup, are a formerly-nomadic community, which spread across Western Asia, North Africa, and Europe, first reaching Spain in the 15th century. The population of Spain is became increasingly diverse due to recent immigration, the earliest modern humans inhabiting Spain are believed to have been Neolithic peoples who may have arrived in the Iberian Peninsula as early as 35, 000–40,000 years ago. In more recent times the Iberians are believed to have arrived or developed in the region between the 4th millennium BC and the 3rd millennium BC, initially settling along the Mediterranean coast, celts settled in Spain during the Iron Age. Some of those tribes in North-central Spain, which had contact with the Iberians, are called Celtiberians. In addition, a known as the Tartessians and later Turdetanians inhabited southwestern Spain. The seafaring Phoenicians, Greeks, and Carthaginians successively founded trading colonies along the Mediterranean coast over a period of several centuries, the Second Punic War between the Carthaginians and Romans was fought mainly in what is now Spain and Portugal. The Roman Republic conquered Iberia during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC transformed most of the region into a series of Latin-speaking provinces, hispania emerged as an important part of the Roman Empire and produced notable historical figures such as Trajan, Hadrian, Seneca and Quintilian. The Germanic Vandals and Suebi, with part of the Iranian Alans under King Respendial, the Suebi became the first Germanic kingdom to convert officially to Roman Catholicism in 447 AD. under king Rechiar. After two centuries of domination by the Visigothic Kingdom, the Iberian Peninsula was invaded by a Muslim force under Tariq Bin Ziyad in 711 and this army consisted mainly ethnic Berbers from the Ghomara tribe, which were reinforced by Arabs from Syria once the conquest was complete. Muslim Iberia became part of the Umayyad Caliphate and would be known as Al-Andalus, the Berbers of Al Andalus revolted as early as 740 AD, halting Arab expansion across the Pyrenees into France
7.
Postmodern literature
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Postmodern works are seen as a response against dogmatic following of Enlightenment thinking and Modernist approaches to literature. Postmodern literature, like postmodernism as a whole, tends to resist definition or classification as a movement, Postmodern works also tend to celebrate chance over craft, and further employ metafiction to undermine the texts authority or authenticity. In the 1910s, artists associated with Dadaism celebrated chance, parody, playfulness, tristan Tzara claimed in How to Make a Dadaist Poem that to create a Dadaist poem one had only to put random words in a hat and pull them out one by one. Another way Dadaism influenced postmodern literature was in the development of collage, artists associated with Surrealism, which developed from Dadaism, continued experimentations with chance and parody while celebrating the flow of the subconscious mind. André Breton, the founder of Surrealism, suggested that automatism and he used automatism to create his novel Nadja and used photographs to replace description as a parody of the overly-descriptive novelists he often criticized. Surrealist René Magrittes experiments with signification are used as examples by Jacques Derrida, Foucault also uses examples from Jorge Luis Borges, an important direct influence on many postmodernist fiction writers. He is occasionally listed as a postmodernist, although he started writing in the 1920s, the influence of his experiments with metafiction and magic realism was not fully realized in the Anglo-American world until the postmodern period. Ultimately, this is seen as the highest stratification of criticism among scholars, other early 20th-century novels such as Raymond Roussels Impressions dAfrique and Locus Solus, and Giorgio de Chiricos Hebdomeros have also been identified as important postmodern precursor. Both modern and postmodern literature represent a break from 19th century realism, in addition, both modern and postmodern literature explore fragmentariness in narrative- and character-construction. The Waste Land is often cited as a means of distinguishing modern and postmodern literature, the poem is fragmentary and employs pastiche like much postmodern literature, but the speaker in The Waste Land says, these fragments I have shored against my ruins. Postmodernists, however, often demonstrate that this chaos is insurmountable, the artist is impotent, gertrude Steins playful experiment with metafiction and genre in The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas has been interpreted as postmodern, as with all stylistic eras, no definite dates exist for the rise and fall of postmodernisms popularity. 1941, the year in which Irish novelist James Joyce and English novelist Virginia Woolf both died, is used as a rough boundary for postmodernisms start. Irish novelist Flann OBrien completed The Third Policeman in 1939 and it was rejected for publication and remained supposedly lost until published posthumously in 1967. A revised version called The Dalkey Archive was published before the original in 1964, notwithstanding its dilatory appearance, the literary theorist Keith Hopper regards The Third Policeman as one of the first of that genre they call the postmodern novel. The prefix post, however, does not necessarily imply a new era, rather, it could also indicate a reaction against modernism in the wake of the Second World War. It could also imply a reaction to significant post-war events, the beginning of the Cold War, the Civil Rights Movement, postcolonialism, some further argue that the beginning of postmodern literature could be marked by significant publications or literary events. For others the beginning is marked by moments in critical theory, Jacques Derridas Structure, Sign, though postmodernist literature does not include everything written in the postmodern period, several post-war developments in literature have significant similarities
