Southern

Landlocked country, southern Africa. Area: 150,872 sq mi (390,757 sq km). Population (2007 est.): 12,311,000. Capital: Harare. The Shona make up more than two-thirds of the population; most of the rest are Ndebele, Chewa, and people of European ancestry. Languages: English (official); Bantu languages of the Shona and Ndebele are much more widely spoken. Religions: Christianity (other [mostly independent] Christians, Protestant, Roman Catholic), traditional beliefs. Currency: Zimbabwe dollar. A broad ridge running southwest-northeast, reaching elevations of 4,000–5,000 ft (1,200–1,500 m), dominates Zimbabwe's landscape. The Zambezi River forms the country's northwestern boundary and contains Victoria Falls as well as the Kariba Dam (completed 1959); Lake Kariba, created by the dam, covers some 2,000 sq mi (5,200 sq km). The Limpopo and Save river basins are in the southeast. Agricultural products, livestock, and mineral reserves, including gold, are all economically important. Zimbabwe is a republic with one legislative house; its head of state and government is the president. Remains of Stone Age cultures dating to 500,000 years ago have been found in the area. The first Bantu-speaking peoples reached Zimbabwe during the 5th–10th centuries CE, driving the San inhabitants into the desert. A second migration of Bantu speakers began circa 1830. During that period the British and Afrikaners moved up from the south, and the area came under the administration of the British South Africa Company (1889–1923). Called Southern Rhodesia (1911–64), it became a self-governing British colony in 1923. The colony united in 1953 with Nyasaland (Malawi) and Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) to form the Central African Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. The federation dissolved in 1963, and Southern Rhodesia reverted to its former colonial status. In 1965 it issued a unilateral declaration of independence considered illegal by the British government, which led to economic sanctions against it. The country, which proclaimed itself a republic in 1970, called itself Rhodesia from 1964 to 1979. In 1979 it instituted limited majority rule and changed its name to Zimbabwe Rhodesia. It was granted independence by Britain in 1980 and became Zimbabwe. A multiparty system was established in 1990. The economy began to experience a decline in the 1990s that accelerated dramatically in the 2000s. Long-simmering political tensions between the ruling party and the opposition led to a hotly contested presidential election in 2008.

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U.S. nonsectarian agency founded by Martin Luther King, Jr., and others in 1957 to assist local organizations working for equal rights for African Americans. Operating primarily in the South, it conducted leadership-training programs, citizen-education projects, and voter-registration drives. It played a major role in the historic March on Washington in 1963 and in the campaigns to urge passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. After King's assassination in 1968, Ralph Abernathy became president. In the early 1970s the SCLC was weakened by several schisms, including the departure of Jesse Jackson, who founded Operation PUSH in Chicago.

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Mountain range, South Island, New Zealand. It extends almost the entire length of the island, and it is the highest range in Australasia. It has elevations from 3,000 ft (900 m) to over 10,000 ft (3,050 m), culminating in Mount Cook at 12,316 ft (3,754 m) high. Glaciers descend from the permanently snow-clad top of the range. The range divides the island climatically: the forested western slopes and narrow coastal plain are much wetter than the eastern slopes and wide Canterbury Plains. Much of the southwest area was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1990.

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Education

• Southern University, located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA.
• Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, located in Louisville, Kentucky, USA.
• Southern Adventist University, located in Collegedale, Tennessee, USA.
• Southern Methodist University, located in Dallas, USA.
• Southern High School.

Organizations

• Southern Company, a US electricity corporation.
• Southern Railway, a former railway company in the UK.
• Southern, a current train operating company in the UK with the name inspired by the former
• Southern Railway, a former railway company in the USA.
• Southern Records, an American independent record label.
• Southern Television, a now defunct UK television company, one of the ITV regional franchises.

Surname

• Caleb Southern, American music producer
• Edwin Southern, molecular biologist
• Eileen Southern, American musicologist
• Richard Southern, British historian
• Terry Southern, American writer
• See also Sothern

Other

• Southern All Stars, a Japanese band, also known as SAS or Southern.
• Southern blot (molecular biology).
• Southern England
• Southern English English, spoken in southern England.
• Southern United States.
• Southern American English, a dialect spoken throughout the Southern United States.

See also

• South
• Southern District
• Southern (subnational entity)