A Ton of Crap (60 page)

THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR

Declaration of War
Though President McKinley did not want war, the pressure from the public, including the assistant secretary of the navy, Theodore Roosevelt, grew. On April 11, 1898, McKinley told Congress he supported going to war with Spain. On April 24, Spain declared war on the United States, and the next day, the United States declared war on Spain. To justify going to war, Congress passed the Teller Amendment, in which the United States promised to liberate Cuba.

JANE AUSTEN

Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice
was published in 1813. The book, like much of Austen’s work, uses free indirect speech (meaning in the third person with the essence of first person) to tell the story. The book focuses on the importance of one’s environment and how it affects upbringing and the fact that wealth and a high social status do not necessarily mean one has an advantage.

MODERN ALGEBRA

Rings
A ring is a set, represented by
S
, that is with two binary operations (commonly addition and multiplication). An example of a ring is
R
 = (
S
, 01, 02, 
I
). In this problem,
S
is a set of real numbers, 01 is addition, with its inverse being subtraction, 02 is multiplication, and
I
is identity element zero.

WEATHER

Lightning
In a thundercloud, frozen raindrops hit each other while moving around in the air. These collisions begin to form an electric charge, and soon the entire cloud is full of electrical charges. The protons form at the top while the electrons form at the bottom. A positive charge builds up below the cloud on the ground, and eventually the charges connect, creating a bolt of lightning.

HUNGARIAN

Writing System
When Stephen I of Hungary came to power in the year 1000, the Old Hungarian system of writing was gradually replaced by the Latin alphabet. The Hungarian system of today still uses the Latin alphabet, although it has expanded, modifying characters with accents (such as
á
,
é
,
í
,
ú
,
ö
, and
ü
) to represent sounds not present.

THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR

The Philippines
Without permission, Theodore Roosevelt, the assistant secretary of the navy, ordered the officer in control of the U.S. Asiatic Squadron to attack the Spanish fleet in the capital of the Philippines should the United States declare war. The fleet was quickly defeated. At the same time, Filipino rebel forces continued fighting the Spanish.

JANE AUSTEN

Emma
Emma
was published in December of 1815. Once again, the book focuses on misconstrued romance among genteel women. When starting the novel, Austen said, “I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like.” Emma is a spoiled woman who overestimates her matchmaking abilities. Emma is the first heroine of any of Austen’s books that does not have financial problems, and Emma is a major shift away from themes common in Austen’s work (such as finding a husband and financial security).

MODERN ALGEBRA

Fields
A field is a commutative ring (meaning it has an operation of multiplication) that has nonzero elements that form a group under multiplication. It is an algebraic structure that touches on addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Every field must have two or more elements.

WEATHER

Wind
Wind is simply the air put in motion. Because the surface of the Earth is very dynamic and is not even, the Sun’s radiation is absorbed unevenly. This uneven spread of the Sun’s rays makes some areas hotter than others. Warm air weighs less than cold air, and it begins to rise. Cold air then replaces the warm air as it rises. This creates wind.

HUNGARIAN

Dialects
There are eight major dialects in Hungarian: Alföld, Danube-Tisza, West Danube, King’s Pass Hungarian, Northwest Hungarian, Northeast Hungarian, Székely, and West Hungarian. These are all mutually intelligible. The most significant dialect is Csángó. Due to its isolation (it is located in the Romanian area of Bacău), it has the most differences of any of the dialects.