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Dionne Brand

Dionne Brand (born 7 January 1953) is a Canadian poet, novelist, essayist and documentarian. She was Toronto's third Poet Laureate from September 2009 to November 2012 and first Black Poet Laureate. She was admitted to the Order of Canada in 2017 and has won the Governor General's Award for Poetry, the Trillium Prize for Literature, the Pat Lowther Award for Poetry, the Harbourfront Writers' Prize, and the Toronto Book Award. Brand currently resides in Toronto.

Early life and education
Dionne Brand was born in Guayaguayare, Trinidad and Tobago. She graduated from Naparima Girls' High School in San Fernando, Trinidad, in 1970 and emigrated to Canada. She attended the University of Toronto and earned a BA degree (English and Philosophy) in 1975 and later attained an MA in Philosophy of Education from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) in 1989.

Career
Her first book, Fore Day Morning: Poems, came out in 1978, and since then Brand has published numerous works of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, as well as editing anthologies and working on documentary films with the National Film Board of Canada.

She has held a number of academic positions, including:

 * Assistant Professor of English, University of Guelph (1992–94)
 * Ruth Wynn Woodward Professor in Women's Studies, Simon Fraser University
 * Distinguished Visiting Scholar and Writer-in-Residence, St. Lawrence University, Canton, New York (2004–05)
 * Distinguished Poet for the Ralph Gustafson Poetry Chair, Vancouver Island University (2006)
 * She is currently Professor of English at the School of English and Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph, where she also holds a University Research Chair.

In 2017, she was appointed as poetry editor of McClelland & Stewart, an imprint of Penguin Random House Canada. Brand is also a co-editor of Toronto-based literary journal Brick.

Writing
Brand explores themes of gender, race, sexuality, feminism, diaspora, nation, white male domination, injustices and "the moral hypocrisies of Canada" Despite being often characterized as a Caribbean writer, Brand identifies as a "black Canadian".

She has contributed to many anthologies opposing the violent killings of Black men and women, the massacre of 14 women in Montreal, and racism and inequality as experienced by Aboriginal women of Canada, particularly Helen Betty Osborne's death in the Pas.

A Map to the Door of No Return
Brand explores intergenerational trauma and post memory in her piece A Map to A Door of No Return. Using a variety of different elements, she explores her own experiences through an autobiographical perspective as well as diving into explain a concept she calls "The Door of No Return". The Door is the space in which the history of black people is lost, specifically when slaves from Africa were transported through the Atlantic slave trade. Brand defines the Door of No Return as "that place where our ancestors departed one world for another; the Old World for the New." It is a place that is as metaphorical as it is psychological, as imaginary as it is real. It is not a physical door, in the sense that it be found at a single location, but rather a collection of locations. At the same time, however, the Door can bring profound grief and pain to many in the Diaspora when they visit it—for example, at the slave caves in Ghana or Gorée Island—or encounter it, as Brand does when she flies over it and feels overwhelmed, tense, consumed with thoughts and feelings and images. The Door is a site of traceable beginnings that are left at the doorsteps, eventually forgotten and lost in historical and familial memory, as demonstrated when Brand's grandfather can no longer remember the name of the ancestral people they belong to. When passing through The Door, people lost their history, their humanity, and their ancestry. This trauma is still felt by black people today, which is the perspective from which Brand explores the concept. She gives examples of this through sports. she writes: "I hear my neighbour downstairs enter Shaquille O'Neal's body every night of the NBA Championships this year" Brand also describes how her interactions with her grandfather eventually became "mutually disappointing" and led to estrangement, as he could not remember the name of their tribe, the people they came from, and could not, thus, remember their family history. Essentially, Brand's short anecdote is about the insufficiency of memory and how incredibly limiting that is. The "fissure" that developed between her grandfather and herself parallels the "fissure between the past and the present", that gap in memory, as represented by the Door of No Return. There is a sort of historical, intergenerational trauma that is associated with this loss of memory, as those in the Diaspora can feel profound grief and pain from their interactions with the Door of No Return ("one does not return to the Diaspora with good news from the door" ).

Brand begins A Map to the Door of No Return by recounting her long-standing struggle with her grandfather to remember where their ancestors were from. She marks this as being the first time she felt a burning desire to know her ancestry, stating that "a small space opened in [her]" (Brand 4) and that not knowing was "profoundly disturbing" (Brand 5). She describes this moment of recognition as reaching the door of no return; a place where our ancestors departed one world for another (Brand 5). In this moment, she is confronted with the reality that her life will consist of a never ending battle to complete her identity. Brand is intentional to note that her desire only came into full effect when she was denied knowledge of her ancestry. Contrary to Frantz Fanon's theory that the pivotal moment in a Black child's life is the moment when they come in contact with the white world and are confronted with the full weight of their blackness, Brand's awakening was not dependent on the white world. The onset of her inner struggle to find belonging and self-assuredness occurred in an entirely black space. This feeling of being incomplete is common among Black people throughout the diaspora and, as Brand demonstrates, and is one of the driving forces in her desire to know her ancestry.

As with her struggle to remember her ancestors, Brand suggests that black individuals experience the sort of "double consciousness" that W. E. B. Du Bois discusses in his work ''The Souls of Black Folk', the idea of having to understand two different approaches as they go through life.

Another theme explored in A Map to the Door of No Return is the theory and praxis of geography. In the text, Brand references several maps, geographers, and ideas related to geography and navigation (e.g. the Babylonian map, David Turnbull and "way-finding", Charles Bricker, the North Star and the Big Dipper, etc.) Juxtaposing these references to her analyses and reflections, she begins to deconstruct and challenge the systems of logic that constitute geography and borders, the way geography has been constructed and hailed as truth, and the emphasis we place on origins when we should not, as origins are not only arbitrary, but they also reproduce the violence of the nation-state. As seen in her explanation, analysis, and subsequent application of Charles Bricker's notes on Ludolf and how asinine he (Ludolf) was, it's apparent that geography and the knowledge that is produced from this discipline is flawed.

Brand uses figurative language in the text. Water, doors, the radio and memory figure boldly and lyrically. Through this figurative language, Brand links form and content where the figurativeness of her language, mimics the literal images of slavery that Brand witnessed on her journey to Africa. Her metaphors also help elaborate and emphasize her thoughts, and the understanding of the door. As she puts it, "The door casts a haunting spell on personal and collective consciousness in the Diaspora."

Rivers Have Sources, Trees Have Roots
In Rivers Have Sources, Trees Have Roots (1986), Brand and co-author Krisantha Sri Bhaggiyadatta interviewed a hundred people from the Canadian Native, Black, Chinese, and South Asian communities about their perceptions of racism and its impact on their lives. The authors critiqued the existence and ubiquity of racism, disparities and resistance, arguing that two themes exist where racism prevails in their interviewees' lives: through "the culture of racism" and through structural and institutional ways.

Rivers gives each individual an opportunity to speak about his or her personal and migration story. The interviewees speak of their anger, resentments, and complaints of being treated as different and inferior. Brand sees racism as a powerful tool to censor oppositional voices and disagrees with the conception of racism as isolated or unusual.

No Language Is Neutral
No Language is Neutral was originally published in 1990 by Coach House Press. It is a 50-page tour-de-force which tackles issues of immigration, environmentalism, slavery, lesbian love, identity, place and the female body, all from a no-holds-barred Black feminist perspective. The title of the book indicates that Brand is in conversation with writers of the Black Diaspora, namely Derek Walcott. Susan Gingell goes as far as to call him her "antithetical literary ancestor" whose views Brand fights against and rewrites in No Language is Neutral. She is calling out Walcott, who in her opinion plays to the belief that "colonization brought civilization, brought culture". She confidently posits herself as the antidote to Walcott: he is the "Black colonial" who through literature dances with oppression instead of fighting it. In the Caribbean context, Brand's literary forebears had almost been exclusively male so her take in No Language is Neutral is of particular importance and her calling out of Walcott even more revolutionary.

Coach House Press contracted Grace Channer to do the cover art of the book. Cohesive with Brand's vision, Channer produced a cover which depicts the bare breasts of a woman caressed by a hardened fist. The cover plays with the softness of themes such as love and desire but the hardened fist is there as a reminder of the difficult politics Brand is confronting in this volume. In her acknowledgements Brand thanks Ted Chamberlin, Michael Ondaatje and The Sisterhood to the Toronto Black Women's Collective. No Language is Neutral is blurbed by Michelle Cliff, Dorothy Livesay, Nicole Brossard and Betsy Warland.

The critic Winfried Siemerling described No Language is Neutral as a "breakthrough volume" for its uninhibitedness. In 1991 the critic Ronald B. Hatch wrote that the "highly provocative material" in No Language Is Neutral coupled with "the Trinidadian English" was "monotonous" and lacked "imagistic representation". He said that the fault in No Language is Neutral was that it was "highly formal" and "highly rationalist" as if expecting Brand to write the opposite because of her "other"/ "exotic" status. Brand, however, did not conform to any of these expectations, as can be seen in her later work too. Her incorporation of Patois in her prose-like poems for example continued way past No Language is Neutral.

"No Language Is Neutral, sold over 6,000 copies, a remarkable number, even with a Governor General's Award nomination." Today, it has been adopted into school curricula Canada-wide.

"St. Mary Estate"
Personal experience and ancestral memory inform her short story "St. Mary Estate", from Sans Souci and Other Stories, pp. 360–366. The narrator, accompanied by her sister, revisits the cocoa estate of their birth and childhood, recalling past experiences of racism and shame. She focuses on the summer beach house belonging to "rich whites" that was cleaned by their mother, the daughter of her overseer grandfather. Her anger over discrimination and poverty is triggered by the recollection of living quarters made of thin cardboard with newspapers walls - barracks that depict the physical, social and psychological degradation endured by the slaves who were denied the basic human rights and freedom.

"This Body For Itself"
In "This Body For Itself" (1994), in Bread Out of Stone, Brand discusses the way the black female body is represented. She asserts that in male authored texts, the black female body is often portrayed as motherly or virginal. In female authored texts, the black female body is often portrayed as protector and/or resistor to rape. Brand states that it is understandable why this happens. The avoidance of portraying black female bodies as sexual is out of self-preservation, as black female bodies are often overly sexualized in their portrayal. However, Brand argues that this self-preservation is a trap, because desire and sexuality can be a great source of power, and suppressing this only further suppresses female power to own their own desire. She writes, "The most radical strategy of the female body for itself is the lesbian body confessing all the desire and fascination for itself" (p. 108).

Chronicles of the Hostile Sun
Brand wrote many of the poems in her fifth book of poetry, Chronicles of the Hostile Sun, in response to the United States military occupation of Grenada. Brand had been living in Grenada and working for a Canadian non-profit organization when the United States invasion of the island took place. The Reagan Administration sanctioned the military invasion in response to the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary political party, the New Jewel Movement, led by Maurice Bishop, who became Prime Minister of the island after a coup in 1979. He was arrested and assassinated in the days leading up to the invasion in 1983. Brand's Chronicles of the Hostile Sun, published one year later in 1984, is divided into three sections: Languages, Sieges, and Military Occupations. Poems in the lattermost section refer directly to Grenada, including mentions of Bishop and other prominent political leaders, the island's socio-political landscape, and scenes during and after the harrowing invasion. Titles in this section are often dates of significant events during the occupation, including "October 19th, 1983," the day Bishop was assassinated and "October 25th, 1983," the day the U.S. military began the invasion. The poem "On American numeracy and literacy in the war against Grenada" places the occupation in the broader context of revolution and U.S. military action in Cuba and El Salvador.

Other themes
Other topics addressed in Brand's writing include the sexual exploitation of African women. Brand says, "We are born thinking of travelling back." She writes: "Listen, I am a Black woman whose ancestors were brought to a new world laying tightly packed in ships. Fifteen million of them survived the voyage, five million of them women; millions among them died, were killed, committed suicide in the middle passage."

Brand has received numerous awards. Writer Myriam Chancy says Brand found "it possible ...to engage in personal/critical work which uncovers the connections between us as Black women at the same time as re-discovering that which has been kept from us: our cultural heritage, the language of our grandmothers, ourselves."

Filmmaking
Brand made a number of documentaries with NFB's feminist-film production unit, Studio D, from 1989 to 1996. When Studio D was criticized for its lack of diversity, Rina Fraticelli, the executive producer at the time, created a program called New Initiatives in Film (NIF). It was out of this program that Brand partnered with Ginny Stikeman to create the award-winning Sisters in the Struggle (1991), a "look at Black women in community, labour and feminist organizing". This was part of the Women at the Well trilogy that also included Older, Stronger, Wiser (1989) and Long Time Comin' (1991). Brand's collaboration with producer Stikeman also became the "model for the Internship Component of NIF", which offered production experience at various regional studios across Canada and at Studio D in Montreal. Brand's film Older, Stronger, Wiser (1989), which "features five black women talking about their lives in urban and rural Canada between the 1920s and 1950s", and Sisters in the Struggle, were both distinct films in that they broke away from the mid-1980s survey films and instead focused on local issues to Canadian women.

Brand did not have pointed interest in filmmaking until an opportunity arose to consult on a documentary about racism at Studio D. A white filmmaker was the lead on the project and after meeting with her for several days, Brand decided she did not want to be a part of the film. She told the Studio that she would be willing to "do something about Black women from their point of view," which resulted in Long Time Comin'.

Brand directed Listening for Something… Adrienne Rich and Dionne Brand in Conversation (1996), a filmic reading and discussion between herself and the American elder lesbian writer. Listening for Something was being made during turbulent times as Studio D was being dismantled. Brand has also written the script and text for Under One Sky… Arab Women in North America Talk About the Hijab.

Brand's documentary work frequently focuses on multiculturalism and sexual pluralism in Canada. She warns against state-sponsored images of multiculturalism, stating that true diversity means people having "equal access to equal justice, equal jobs, equal education". Having critiqued the concept of 'nation' as the notion of "leaving out" Black women, Brand has focused much of her work on representation for her communities.

Critical reception
Critics of Brand's early work focused on Caribbean national and cultural identity and Caribbean literary theory. Barbadian poet and scholar Edward Kamau Brathwaite referred to Brand as "our first major exile female poet." Academic J. Edward Chamberlain called her "a final witness to the experience of migration and exile" whose "literary inheritance is in some genuine measure West Indian, a legacy of [Derek] Walcott, Brathwaite and others." They cite her own and others' shifting locations, both literal and theoretical.

Peter Dickinson argues that "Brand 'reterritorializes' … boundaries in her writing, (dis)placing or (dis)locating the national narrative of subjectivity … into the diaspora of cross-cultural, -racial, -gender, -class, and –erotic identifications." Dickinson calls these shifts in her conceptualization of national and personal affiliations "the politics of location [which] cannot be separated from the politics of 'production and reception.'" Critic Leslie Sanders argues that, in Brand's ongoing exploration of the notions of "here" and "there" she uses her own "statelessness" as a vehicle for entering "'other people's experience'" and "'other places.'" In Sanders' words, "by becoming a Canadian writer, Brand is extending the Canadian identity in a way [Marshall] McLuhan would recognize and applaud." But, Dickinson says, "Because Brand's 'here' is necessarily mediated, provisional, evanescent – in a word 'unlocatable' – her work remains marginal/marginalizable in academic discussions of Canadian literary canons."

In Redefining the Subject: Sites of Play in Canadian Women's Writing, Charlotte Sturgess suggests that Brand employs a language "through which identity emerges as a mobile, thus discursive, construct." Sturgess argues that Brand's "work uses language strategically, as a wedge to split European traditions, forms and aesthetics apart; to drive them onto their own borders and contradictions". Sturgess says Brand's work is at least two-pronged: it "underline[s] the enduring ties of colonialism within contemporary society"; and it "investigates the very possibilities of Black, female self-representation in Canadian cultural space".

Italian academic and theorist Franca Bernabei writes in the preamble to Luce ostinata/Tenacious Light (2007), the Italian-English selected anthology of Brand's poetry, that "Brand's poetic production reveals a remarkable variety of formal-stylistic strategies and semantic richness as well as the ongoing pursuit of a voice and a language that embody her political, affective, and aesthetic engagement with the human condition of the black woman—and, more exactly, all those oppressed by the hegemonic program of modernity." The editor and critic Constance Rooke calls Brand "one of the very best [poets] in the world today", and "compare[s] her to Pablo Neruda or—in fiction—to José Saramago."

The Thames Art Gallery in Chatham called Brand's documentary Sisters in the Struggle "radical in its amplifications of the voices of black Canadian women, who reflect on the legacy of the intersection of racism and sexism, alongside their personal battles in community, labour and feminist organizing".

Activism
In addition to being a writer, Brand is a social activist. Openly identifying as a lesbian, Brand is vocal against the discrimination of the LGBT community. She is a founder of the newspaper Our Lives, the first Canadian newspaper devoted to Black women. She is also a past chair of the Women's Issues Committee of the Ontario Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, and does work with immigrant organizations around Toronto.

Awards and honours
Brand's awards include:

 * 1997: Governor General's Award for Poetry and the Trillium Book Award for Land to Light On (1997)
 * 2003: Pat Lowther Award for thirsty (2002)
 * 2006: City of Toronto Book Award for What We All Long For (2005)
 * 2006: Harbourfront Festival Prize in recognition of her important contribution to literature
 * 2006: Fellow of the Academies for Arts, Humanities, and Sciences of Canada (formerly the Royal Society of Canada)
 * 2009: Poet Laureate of Toronto
 * 2011: Griffin Poetry Prize for Ossuaries
 * 2015: Honorary Doctorate from Thorneloe University
 * 2017: Honorary degree from the University of Windsor
 * 2017: Member of the Order of Canada (Invested on 6 September 2018)
 * 2019: Blue Metropolis Violet Prize
 * 2021: Windham-Campbell Literature Prize (fiction)

Poetry

 * 1978: Fore Day Morning: Poems. Toronto: Khoisan Artists, ISBN 0-920662-02-1
 * 1979: Earth Magic. Toronto: Kids Can Press, ISBN 0-919964-25-7
 * 1982: Primitive Offensive. Toronto: Williams-Wallace International Inc., ISBN 0-88795-012-4
 * 1983: Winter Epigrams and Epigrams to Ernesto Cardenal in Defense of Claudia. Toronto: Williams-Wallace International Inc., ISBN 0-676-97101-6
 * 1984: Chronicles of the Hostile Sun. Toronto: Williams-Wallace, ISBN 0-88795-033-7
 * 1990: No Language is Neutral. Toronto: Coach House Press, ISBN 0-88910-395-X; McClelland & Stewart, 1998, ISBN 0-7710-1646-8
 * 1997: Land to Light On. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 0-7710-1645-X
 * 2002: thirsty. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 0-7710-1644-1 (shortlisted for the 2003 Canadian Griffin Poetry Prize) (Excerpt from thirsty, online at CBC Words at Large)
 * 2006: Inventory. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 978-0-7710-1662-2 (Excerpt from Inventory, online at CBC Words at Large)
 * 2010: Ossuaries. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 978-0-7710-1736-0 (winner of the 2011 Canadian Griffin Poetry Prize and Pat Lowther Award)
 * 2018: The Blue Clerk. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 978-0-7710-7081-5 (shortlisted for the 2019 Canadian Griffin Poetry Prize, longlisted for the Pat Lowther Award, Governor General's Awards finalist)
 * 2022: Nomenclature. Durham: Duke University Press, ISBN 978-1-4780-1662-5

Fiction

 * 1988: Sans Souci and Other Stories. Stratford, ON: Williams-Wallace, ISBN 0-88795-072-8 and ISBN 0-88795-073-6
 * 1996: In Another Place, Not Here. Toronto: Knopf Canada, ISBN 0-394-28158-6
 * 1999: At the Full and Change of the Moon. Toronto: Knopf Canada, ISBN 0-394-28158-6
 * 2005: What We All Long For. Toronto: Knopf Canada, ISBN 978-0-676-97693-9
 * 2014: Love Enough. Toronto: Knopf Canada, ISBN 978-0-345-80888-2
 * 2018: Theory, Toronto: Knopf Canada, ISBN 9780735274235

Non-fiction

 * 1986: Rivers have sources, trees have roots: speaking of racism (with Krisantha Sri Bhaggiyadatta). Toronto: Cross Cultural Communications Centre, ISBN 0-9691060-6-8
 * 1991: No Burden to Carry: Narratives of Black Working Women in Ontario, 1920s–1950s (with Lois De Shield). Toronto: Women's Press, ISBN 0-88961-163-7
 * 1994: Imagination, Representation, and Culture
 * 1994: We're Rooted Here and They Can't Pull Us Up: Essays in African Canadian Women's History (with Peggy Bristow, Linda Carty, Afua P. Cooper, Sylvia Hamilton, and Adrienne Shadd). Toronto: University of Toronto Press, ISBN 0-8020-5943-0 and ISBN 0-8020-6881-2
 * 1994: Bread Out of Stone: Recollections on Sex, Recognitions, Race, Dreaming and Politics. Toronto: Coach House Press, ISBN 0-88910-492-1; Toronto: Vintage, 1998, ISBN 0-676-97158-X
 * 2001: A Map to the Door of No Return: Notes to Belonging. Toronto: Random House Canada, ISBN 978-0-385-25892-0 and ISBN 0-385-25892-5
 * 2008: A Kind of Perfect Speech: The Ralph Gustafson Lecture Malaspina University-College 19 October 2006. Nanaimo, BC: Institute for Coastal Research Publishing, ISBN 978-1-896886-05-3
 * 2020: An Autobiography of the Autobiography of Reading. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, ISBN 978-1-77212-508-5

Documentaries

 * Older, Stronger, Wiser. Dir. Claire Prieto. Assoc. Dir. Dionne Brand (Part I, Women at the Well trilogy). National Film Board of Canada, Studio D, 1989
 * Sisters in the Struggle. Dirs. Dionne Brand and Ginny Stikeman (Part II, Women at the Well trilogy). National Film Board of Canada, Studio D, 1991
 * Long Time Comin'. Dir. Dionne Brand. Perf. Faith Nolan and Grace Channer (Part III, Women at the Well trilogy). National Film Board of Canada, Studio D, 1991
 * Listening for Something: Adrienne Rich and Dionne Brand in Conversation. Dir. Dionne Brand. National Film Board of Canada, Studio D, 1996
 * Beyond Borders: Arab Feminists Talk About Their Lives ... East and West. Dir. Jennifer Kawaja. Narr. Dionne Brand. National Film Board of Canada, 1999
 * Under One Sky: Arab Women in North America Talk About the Hijab. Dir. Jennifer Kawaja. Narr. Dionne Brand. National Film Board of Canada, 1999
 * Borderless: A Docu-Drama About the Lives of Undocumented Workers. Dir. Min Sook Lee. Narr. Dionne Brand. KAIROS Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives, 2006.

Anthologies edited

 * 2007: The Journey Prize Stories: The Best of Canada's New Stories (with Caroline Adderson and David Bezmozqis, comps. and eds). Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, ISBN 978-0-7710-9561-0
 * 2017: The Unpublished City, BookThug, ISBN 9781771663731

Archives
There is a Dionne Brand fond at Library and Archives Canada, containing multiple media including 4.89 meters of textual records, 78 audio cassettes and two posters.

title: Dionne Brand


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Agenda

Agenda (: agendum) may refer to:

Information management

 * Agenda (meeting), points to be discussed and acted upon, displayed as a list
 * Political agenda, the set of goals of an ideological group
 * Lotus Agenda, a DOS-based personal information manager
 * Personal organizer or agenda, a small notebook for organizing personal information

Music

 * Agenda (EP), by Pet Shop Boys, 2019
 * The Agenda (album), by Cold Blank, 2012

Organizations

 * Agenda (charity), a UK-based charity that campaigns for women and girls at risk
 * Agenda (think tank), a Norwegian think tank focused on politics and international affairs

Periodicals and books

 * Agenda (feminist journal), an African academic journal of feminism
 * Agenda (poetry journal), a UK literary periodical
 * Agenda (liturgy), a book used in Lutheran worship
 * The Agenda, a 1994 book by Bob Woodward

Places

 * Agenda, Kansas, a city in the United States
 * Agenda, Wisconsin, a town in the United States

Television

 * Agenda (Australian TV program), a series of programs since 2010
 * Agenda (British TV programme), a 1980s current affairs programme
 * Agenda (Irish TV programme), a 1999–2004 current events programme
 * Agenda (New Zealand TV programme), a 1999–2009 current events programme
 * Agenda (Swedish TV program), a 2001 current events programme
 * The Agenda, an Ontario, Canada, current affairs program since 2006
 * The Agenda with Tom Bradby, a 2012–2016 British chat show

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Agenda


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List of governors of South Dakota

The governor of South Dakota is the head of government of the U.S. state of South Dakota. The current governor is Kristi Noem, representing the Republican Party, serving since 2019.

Governors
Dakota Territory was organized on March 2, 1861; on November 2, 1889, it was split into the states of North Dakota and South Dakota.

The Constitution of South Dakota originally provided for the election of a governor and lieutenant governor every two years with no limits. A law passed in 1947 prohibited parties from nominating someone who had served two consecutive terms, effectively creating a term limit, and an amendment in 1972 increased term lengths to four years while formally prohibiting someone from serving three consecutive terms. Should the office of governor become vacant, the lieutenant governor becomes governor.

title: List of governors of South Dakota


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Tevet

Tevet (Hebrew:, Standard Ṭevet; Tiberian Ṭēḇēṯ; from Akkadian ṭebētu) is the fourth month of the civil year and the tenth month of the ecclesiastical year on the Hebrew calendar. It follows Kislev and precedes Shevat. It is a month of 29 days. Tevet usually occurs in December–January on the Gregorian calendar. In the Babylonian calendar its name was Araḫ Ṭebētum, the "muddy month".

Gregorian new year
The Gregorian New Year's Day (1 January) nearly always occurs in this month. Only rarely will it occur in either of the two neighbouring months (Kislev or Shevat).

Holidays

 *  25 Kislev – 2 Tevet  – Hanukkah (or 3 Tevet if Kislev is short)
 * 10 Tevet – Tenth of Tevet (Asara beTevet), a fast day

Community holidays

 * 5 Tevet is celebrated as a holiday by Chabad Hasidim, commemorating the 1987 verdict concerning an inheritance claim on the books of Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn.

In Jewish history and tradition

 * 1 Tevet (circa 479 BC) – Esther was taken to King Achashverosh's palace, leading to her becoming queen (Book of Esther 2:16-17).
 * 9 Tevet (1066) – The 1066 Granada massacre takes place, as a Muslim mob massacres 4,000 Jews throughout the city.
 * 10 Tevet (588 BC) – Nebuchadnezzar II's armies besiege Jerusalem; now commemorated as a fast day.
 * 10 Tevet (479 BC) – Esther appears before Achashverosh for the first time and is chosen by him to be the queen.
 * 11 Tevet (1668) – Jews were expelled from Vienna, Austria, during the reign of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold the First.
 * 17 Tevet (1728) – Shearith Israel, the first New York synagogue, erects its first building in Lower Manhattan.
 * 20 Tevet (1483) – The first volume of the Babylonian Talmud, the tractate Berachot, is printed in Soncino, Italy.
 * 22 Tevet (1496) – Expulsion of Jews from Portugal, four years after the expulsion from Spain.
 * 24 Tevet (3rd century BC) – Jewish elders procure the translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek (Septuagint) for Ptolemy II Philadelphus.
 * 24 Tevet (1812) - Death of the Alter Rebbe founder of the Chabad philosophy and author of the Tanya and Shulchan Aruch HaRav.
 * 25 Tevet (1559) – Chovot HaLevavot published
 * 25 Tevet (circa 332 BC) – Alexander the Great met the high priest after the Samaritans said the Jews intended to betray him.
 * 28 Tevet (81 BC) – Shimon ben Shetach ejects the Sadducees from the Sanhedrin, replacing them with his Pharisaic disciples loyal to the Mishnah.

title: Tevet


text:
Talk:CodedColor PhotoStudio Pro

Untitled
Noting the de-advertising step taken a few pages back in the history of this article, is it necessary to watch the other User contributions of Codedcolor? It is quite noticeable that the username is identical to the program that he seems to be repeatedly plugging (sometimes in a more or less encyclopedic fashion, sometimes not). Additionally, aspiring graphic designer that I am, I have never heard of the program before. What do do? Ed Cormany 16:48 23 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * 1450 Google hits (not many), but it appears to be German product despite the US spelling, so English Google may not be fair. But yes, this is one to watch.  jimfbleak 16:57 23 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Screen editor.jpeg
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— Save_Us _ 229  23:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

title: Talk:CodedColor PhotoStudio Pro


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Talk:Secretariat (horse)

Whats and Whos
Per WP:BRD, individually-named animals are not a thing, they are a being, hence a "who" not a "what." Montanabw (talk) 22:22, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Article changes discussion
As indicated above, significant changes to a Featured Article should first be discussed on this talk page. Then it can be discussed by others, and a consensus can be found. See Consensus.

As regarding consistency of layout in articles, that is laid out in the policy Manual of Style/Biography. I see nothing in said policy that requires infoboxes between articles of the same subject type to be the same. Regarding the "importance" of article title" as to whether there is disambiguator of (horse) or not, the presence of this or not does not indicate any type of importance. See Disambiguation. dawnleelynn(talk) 03:36, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

p.s. In the area where I work, rodeo, all of the 8 events have different infoboxes within them; there is no consistency. For example, the bull riders have a few different types of infobox boxes used in there; and I am pretty sure that there is no policy that recommends this or other types of consistency beyond what the Manual of Style lays out. dawnleelynn(talk) 05:07, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

"Croup" linking style.
Hi there,

Not many people read Wikipedia's style guidelines: In particular, the guidelines on linking. Here is a section of note:

MOS:SUBMARINE

The gist (in the context of single terms) is that the text of a link should be as similar as possible to the text used in the phrase that points to the link. So in this instance, a link should be either

 * croup, or:
 * rump, but not:
 * rump.

Or to put it another way: The purpose of link formatting is to modify a word to fit the surrounding grammar—not to switch it out for a different word. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BoiledAlaska (talk • contribs) 16:50, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

 * The word "croup" refers to the topline of the rump of a horse. The article links to the proper page.  There was a long debate years ago about there being a separate article defining the croup as opposed to the rump. No surprise  Montanabw (talk) 21:27, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

lede.
this article 100% deserves the good article designation, and it has been given that title for a reason: i acknowledge that. however, i feel as though the lede is awfully long. a lot of the information given could be included in the other sections. the lede should be succinct. Ayyydoc (talk) 18:28, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

 * I feel that the Lead should contain no more than four paragraphs, but this is easily remedied. Also claims like "the greatest of all time" are always highly problematic: how can this be assessed when Europe and N. America use different rating systems? For that text to appear in a FA is a very bad idea. More importantly, there is no mention made in the Lead of the horse's incredible physical qualities that helped make him the phenomenon he was. That is surprising when a whole sub-section is (correctly) devoted to that point. In that regard, the Lead is deficient. Billsmith60 (talk) 13:52, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Secretariat Racing Into History

 * https://paulickreport.com/horse-care-category/secretariat-racing-into-history-monument-will-be-dedicated-on-march-30
 * https://richmond.com/news/community/mechanicsville-local/well-traveled-secretariat-sculpture-will-preside-over-ashland-holiday-parade/article_f097d3c2-7cd8-11ee-88f2-f71645265eb2.html
 * https://equusmagazine.com/news/virginia-town-set-to-dedicate-secretariat-monument

I think this statue is already referenced in the article, but do we want to include the work's title, Secretariat Racing Into History? --- Another Believer ( Talk ) 04:53, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Secretariat (horse)


text: User talk:64.230.65.171

title: User talk:64.230.65.171


text:
List of governors of Iowa

The governor of Iowa is the head of government of the U.S. state of Iowa. The governor is the head of the executive branch of the state government and is charged with enforcing state laws. The officeholder has the power to either approve or veto bills passed by the Iowa General Assembly, to convene the legislature, as well as to grant pardons, except in cases of treason and impeachment. The governor of Iowa is also the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces.

There have been 41 individuals who held the position of Iowa governor, with two of those serving multiple distinct terms, Samuel J. Kirkwood and Terry Branstad. The current governor, Kim Reynolds, is the first woman to hold the position and was sworn in on May 24, 2017. The longest-serving is Terry Branstad, who served from 1983 to 1999 and then again from 2011 to 2017. He is the longest-serving governor in U.S. history, surpassing the previous record of 21 years set by George Clinton of New York. The shortest-serving was Robert D. Fulton, who served 16 days.

Territory of Iowa
Iowa Territory was formed on July 4, 1838, from Wisconsin Territory. It had four governors appointed by the president of the United States, though the first resigned days after he was confirmed by the Senate and before ever reaching the territory.

State of Iowa
The southeast portion of Iowa Territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Iowa on December 28, 1846. The first Constitution of Iowa, adopted in 1846, created the office of governor with a four-year term, with no specific start date. The 1857 constitution reduced this term to two years, but an amendment in 1972 increased this back to four years. The 1857 constitution also set the start of the term to the second Monday in the January following the election, which was moved one day later by a 1988 amendment.

The office of lieutenant governor was created in the 1857 constitution, elected for the same term as the governor. An amendment in 1988 specified that the lieutenant governor would be elected on the same ticket as the governor. If the office becomes vacant, it devolves upon the lieutenant governor for the remainder of the term or vacancy. Prior to 1857, if the office became vacant, the Secretary of State of Iowa would act as governor. There is no term limit on the number of terms a governor may serve.

title: List of governors of Iowa


text:
Bargaining

In the social sciences, bargaining or haggling is a type of negotiation in which the buyer and seller of a good or service debate the price or nature of a transaction. If the bargaining produces agreement on terms, the transaction takes place. It is often commonplace in poorer countries, or poorer localities within any specific country. Haggling can mostly be seen within street markets worldwide, wherein there remains no guarantee of the origin and authenticity of available products. Many people attribute it as a skill, but there remains no guarantee that the price put forth by the buyer would be acknowledged by the seller, resulting in losses of profit and even turnover in some cases. A growth in the country's GDP Per Capita Income is bound to reduce both the ill-effects of bargaining and the unscrupulous practices undertaken by vendors at street markets.

Although the most apparent aspect of bargaining in markets is as an alternative pricing strategy to fixed prices, it can also include making arrangements for credit or bulk purchasing, as well as serving as an important method of clienteling.

Bargaining has largely disappeared in parts of the world where retail stores with fixed prices are the most common place to purchase goods. However, for expensive goods such as homes, antiques and collectibles, jewellery and automobiles, bargaining can remain commonplace.

Dickering and "haggling" refer to the same process.

Where it takes place
Haggling is associated commonly with bazaars and other markets where centralized regulation is difficult or impossible. Both religious beliefs and regional custom may determine whether or not the sellers or buyers are willing to bargain.

Regional differences
In North America, Australia, and Europe, bargaining is restricted to expensive or one-of-a-kind items (automobiles, antiques, jewelry, art, real estate, trade sales of businesses) and informal sales settings such as flea markets and garage sales. In other regions of the world, bargaining may be the norm, even for small commercial transactions.

In Indonesia and elsewhere in Asia, locals haggle for goods and services everywhere from street markets to hotels. Even children learn to haggle from a young age. Participating in that tradition can make foreigners feel accepted. On the other hand, in Thailand, haggling seems to be softer than the other countries due to Thai culture, in which people tend to be humble and avoiding of arguments. However, haggling for food items is strongly discouraged in Southeast Asia and is considered an insult, because food is seen as a common necessity that is not to be treated as a tradable good.

In almost all large complex business negotiations, a certain amount of bargaining takes place. One simplified 'western' way to decide when it's time to bargain is to break negotiation into two stages: creating value and claiming value. Claiming value is another phrase for bargaining. Many cultures take offense when they perceive the other side as having started bargaining too soon. This offense is usually as a result of their wanting to first create value for longer before they bargain together. The Chinese culture, by contrast, places a much higher value on taking time to build a business relationship before starting to create value or bargain. Not understanding when to start bargaining has ruined many an otherwise positive business negotiation.

In areas where bargaining at the retail level is common, the option to bargain often depends on the presence of the store's owner. A chain store managed by clerks is more likely to use fixed pricing than an independent store managed by an owner or one of the owner's trusted employees.

Behavioral theory
The personality theory in bargaining emphasizes that the type of personalities determine the bargaining process and its outcome. A popular behavioral theory deals with a distinction between hard-liners and soft-liners. Various research papers refer to hard-liners as warriors, while soft-liners are shopkeepers. It varies from region to region. Bargaining may take place more in rural and semi-urban areas than in a metro city.

Game theory
Bargaining games refer to situations where two or more players must reach an agreement regarding how to distribute an object or monetary amount. Each player prefers to reach an agreement in these games, rather than abstain from doing so. However, each prefers that the agreement favor their interests. Examples of such situations include the bargaining involved in a labor union and the directors of a company negotiating wage increases, the dispute between two communities about the distribution of a common territory, or the conditions under which two countries agree on nuclear disarmament. Analyzing these kinds of problems looks for a solution that specifies which component in dispute corresponds to each party involved. Players in a bargaining problem can bargain for the objective as a whole at a precise moment in time. The problem can also be divided so that parts of the whole objective become subject to bargaining during different stages.

In a classical bargaining problem, the result is an agreement reached between all interested parties or the status quo of the problem. It is clear that studying how individual parties make their decisions is insufficient for predicting what agreement will be reached. However, classical bargaining theory assumes that each participant in a bargaining process will choose between possible agreements, following the conduct predicted by the rational choice model. It is particularly assumed that each player's preferences regarding the possible agreements can be represented by a von Neumann–Morgenstern utility theorem function.

Nash [1950] defines a classical bargaining problem as being a set of joint allocations of utility, some of which correspond to what the players would obtain if they reach an agreement, and another that represents what they would get if they failed to do so.

A bargaining game for two players is defined as a pair (F,d) where F is the set of possible joint utility allocations (possible agreements), and d is the disagreement point.

For the definition of a specific bargaining solution, it is usual to follow Nash's proposal, setting out the axioms this solution should satisfy. Some of the most frequent axioms used in the building of bargaining solutions are efficiency, symmetry, independence of irrelevant alternatives, scalar invariance, monotonicity, etc.

The Nash bargaining solution is the bargaining solution that maximizes the product of an agent's utilities on the bargaining set.

The Nash bargaining solution, however, only deals with the simplest structure of bargaining. It is not dynamic (failing to deal with how Pareto outcomes are achieved). Instead, for situations where the structure of the bargaining game is important, a more mainstream game-theoretic approach is useful. This can allow players' preferences over time and risk to be incorporated into the solution of bargaining games. It can also show how the details can matter. For example, the Nash bargaining solution for the prisoners' dilemma is different from the Nash equilibrium.

Bargaining and posted prices in retail markets
Retailers can choose to sell at posted prices or allow bargaining: selling at a public posted price commits the retailer not to exploit buyers once they enter the retail store, making the store more attractive to potential customers, while a bargaining strategy has the advantage that it allows the retailer to price discriminate between different types of customer. In some markets, such as those for automobiles and expensive electronic goods, firms post prices but are open to haggling with consumers. When the proportion of haggling consumers goes up, prices tend to rise.

Processual theory
This theory isolates distinctive elements of the bargaining chronology in order to better understand the complexity of the negotiating process. Several key features of the processual theory include:
 * Bargaining range
 * Critical risk
 * Security point

Integrative theory
Integrative bargaining (also called "interest-based bargaining," "win-win bargaining") is a negotiation strategy in which parties collaborate to find a "win-win" solution to their dispute. This strategy focuses on developing mutually beneficial agreements based on the interests of the disputants. Interests include the needs, desires, concerns, and fears important to each side. They are the underlying reasons why people become involved in a conflict.

"Integrative refers to the potential for the parties' interests to be [combined] in ways that create joint value or enlarge the pie." Potential for integration only exists when there are multiple issues involved in the negotiation. This is because the parties must be able to make trade-offs across issues in order for both sides to be satisfied with the outcome.

Automated bargaining
When a bargaining situation is complex, finding Nash equilibrium is difficult using game theory. Evolutionary computation methods have been designed for automated bargaining, and demonstrated efficient and effective for approximating Nash equilibrium.

title: Bargaining


text:
Darwin Mounds

Darwin Mounds is a large field of undersea sand mounds situated off the north west coast of Scotland that were first discovered in May 1998. They provide a unique habitat for ancient deep water coral reefs and were found using remote sensing techniques during surveys funded by the oil industry and steered by the joint industry and United Kingdom government group the Atlantic Frontier Environment Network (AFEN) (Masson and Jacobs 1998). The mounds were named after the research vessel, itself named for the eminent naturalist and evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin.

The mounds are about 1000 m below the surface of the North Atlantic ocean, approximately 100 nmi north-west of Cape Wrath, the north-west tip of mainland Scotland. There are hundreds of mounds in the field, which in total cover approximately 100 km2. Individual mounds are typically circular, up to 5 m high and 100 m wide. Most of the mounds are also distinguished by the presence of an additional feature referred to as a 'tail'. The tails are of a variable extent and may merge with others, but are generally a teardrop shape and are orientated south-west of the mound. The mound-tail feature of the Darwin Mounds is apparently unique globally.

Composition
The mounds are mostly sand, currently interpreted as "sand volcanoes". These features are caused when fluidised sand "de-waters" and the fluid bubbles up through the sand, pushing the sediment up into a cone shape. Sand volcanoes are common in the Devonian fossil record in UK, and in seismically active areas of the planet. In this case, tectonic activity is unlikely; some form of slumping on the south-west side of the undersea (Wyville-Thomson) Ridge being a more likely cause. The tops of the mounds have living stands of Lophelia and blocky rubble (interpreted as coral debris). The mounds provide one of the largest known northerly cold-water habitats for coral species. The mounds are also unusual in that Lophelia pertusa, a cold water coral, appears to be growing on sand rather than a hard substratum. Prior to research on the mounds in 2000, it was thought that Lophelia required a hard substratum for attachment.

The deep-water coral systems on the mounds are especially fragile. Unlike shallow-water coral reefs, they are not adapted to cope with minor disturbances such as wave action. The mounds also support significant populations of the xenophyophore Syringammina fragilissima. This is a giant single-celled organism (a protozoan) that is widespread in deep waters, but occurs in particularly high densities on the mounds and the tails. Individual xenophyophores can grow to be larger than 20 cm and are often very fragile. The corals themselves provide a habitat for a wide diversity of other marine life including sponges, worms, crustaceans and molluscs. Among these starfish, sea urchins and crabs. Various fish have been observed, including blue ling, roundnose grenadier, and the orange roughy.

Conservation efforts
On 23 October 2001, UK Minister Margaret Beckett made a commitment at WWF's Oceans Recovery Summit in Edinburgh to protect the Darwin Mounds. The summit launched the Edinburgh Declaration, targeting politicians and marine stakeholders alike to sign up to action to safeguard the seas. Deep water bottom trawling had been occurring in the area, with nets as heavy as one tonne dragged across the sea floor. Researcher Jason Hall-Spencer of the University of Glasgow had found pieces of coral at least 4,500 years old in the nets of trawlers operating off the coast of Ireland and Scotland. Pieces of coral up to 1 m2 were found in the nets of French trawling vessels that had been scraping the seabed 1 km down. It is known that much coral was destroyed by these nets and the mounds themselves in some areas were found to be scraped and flattened. The mounds are ancient structures, and this damage is permanent.

After the discovery of the mounds, three well-documented surveys of the area were undertaken, one in June 1998 (Bett 1999), August 1999 (Bett & Jacobs 2000,) and twice during summer 2000 (B. Bett, pers. comm.). Instruments deployed during the studies included side-scan sonar, stills and video cameras and piston corers. However, the entirety of what was lost to heavy-netted fishing trawlers remains unknown. On 22 March 2004 EU Fisheries Ministers in Brussels agreed to give permanent protection to the United Kingdom's unique cold-water coral reefs, recognising the Darwin Mounds as an important habitat. In 2004 deep-water bottom trawling in the area was made illegal.

title: Darwin Mounds


text:
Qibla

The qibla (قِبْلَة) is the direction towards the Kaaba in the Sacred Mosque in Mecca, which is used by Muslims in various religious contexts, particularly the direction of prayer for the salah. In Islam, the Kaaba is believed to be a sacred site built by prophets Abraham and Ishmael, and that its use as the qibla was ordained by God in several verses of the Quran revealed to Muhammad in the second Hijri year. Prior to this revelation, Muhammad and his followers in Medina faced Jerusalem for prayers. Most mosques contain a (a wall niche) that indicates the direction of the qibla.

The qibla is also the direction for entering the (sacred state for the hajj pilgrimage); the direction to which animals are turned during  (Islamic slaughter); the recommended direction to make  (supplications); the direction to avoid when relieving oneself or spitting; and the direction to which the deceased are aligned when buried. The qibla may be observed facing the Kaaba accurately or facing in the general direction. Most Islamic scholars consider that is acceptable if the more precise  cannot be ascertained.

The most common technical definition used by Muslim astronomers for a location is the direction on the great circle—in the Earth's Sphere—passing through the location and the Kaaba. This is the direction of the shortest possible path from a place to the Kaaba, and allows the exact calculation of the qibla using a spherical trigonometric formula that takes the coordinates of a location and of the Kaaba as inputs (see formula below). The method is applied to develop mobile applications and websites for Muslims, and to compile qibla tables used in instruments such as the qibla compass. The qibla can also be determined at a location by observing the shadow of a vertical rod on the twice-yearly occasions when the Sun is directly overhead in Mecca—on 27 and 28 May at 12:18 Saudi Arabia Standard Time (09:18 UTC), and on 15 and 16 July at 12:27 SAST (09:27 UTC).

Before the development of astronomy in the Islamic world, Muslims used traditional methods to determine the qibla. These methods included facing the direction that the companions of Muhammad had used when in the same place; using the setting and rising points of celestial objects; using the direction of the wind; or using due south, which was Muhammad's qibla in Medina. Early Islamic astronomy was built on its Indian and Greek counterparts, especially the works of Ptolemy, and soon Muslim astronomers developed methods to calculate the approximate directions of the qibla, starting from the mid-9th century. In the late 9th and 10th centuries, Muslim astronomers developed methods to find the exact direction of the qibla which are equivalent to the modern formula. Initially, this "qibla of the astronomers" was used alongside various traditionally determined qiblas, resulting in much diversity in medieval Muslim cities. In addition, the accurate geographic data necessary for the astronomical methods to yield an accurate result was not available before the 18th and 19th centuries, resulting in further diversity of the qibla. Historical mosques with differing qiblas still stand today throughout the Islamic world. The spaceflight of a devout Muslim, Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, to the International Space Station (ISS) in 2007 generated a discussion with regard to the qibla direction from low Earth orbit, prompting the Islamic authority of his home country, Malaysia, to recommend determining the qibla "based on what is possible" for the astronaut.

Location
The qibla is the direction of the Kaaba, a cube-like building at the centre of the Sacred Mosque () in Mecca, in the Hijaz region of Saudi Arabia. Other than its role as qibla, it is also the holiest site for Muslims, also known as the House of God and where the  (the circumambulation ritual) is performed during the Hajj and umrah pilgrimages. The Kaaba has an approximately rectangular ground plan with its four corners pointing close to the four cardinal directions. According to the Quran, it was built by Abraham and Ishmael, both of whom are prophets in Islam. Few historical records remain detailing the history of the Kaaba before the rise of Islam, but in the generations prior to Muhammad, the Kaaba had been used as a shrine of the pre-Islamic Arabic religion.

The qibla status of the Kaaba (or the Sacred Mosque in which it is located) is based on the verses 144, 149, and 150 of the al-Baqarah chapter of the Quran, each of which contains a command to "turn your face toward the Sacred Mosque". According to Islamic traditions, these verses were revealed in the month of Rajab or Sha'ban in the second Hijri year (623 CE), or about 15 or 16 months after Muhammad's migration to Medina. Prior to these revelations, Muhammad and the Muslims in Medina had prayed towards Jerusalem as the qibla, the same direction as the prayer direction—the —used by the Jews of Medina. Islamic tradition says that these verses were revealed during a prayer congregation; Muhammad and his followers immediately changed their direction from Jerusalem to Mecca in the middle of the prayer ritual. The location of this event became the Masjid al-Qiblatayn ("The Mosque of the Two Qiblas").

There are different reports of the qibla direction when Muhammad was in Mecca (before his migration to Medina). According to a report cited by historian al-Tabari and exegete (textual interpreter) al-Baydawi, Muhammad prayed towards the Kaaba. Another report, cited by al-Baladhuri and also by al-Tabari, says that Muhammad prayed towards Jerusalem while in Mecca. Another report, mentioned in Ibn Hisham's biography of Muhammad, says that Muhammad prayed in such a way as to face the Kaaba and Jerusalem simultaneously. Today Muslims of all branches, including the Sunni and the Shia, all pray towards the Kaaba. Historically, one major exception was the Qarmatians, a now-defunct syncretic Shia sect which rejected the Kaaba as the qibla; in 930, they sacked Mecca and for a time took the Kaaba's Black Stone to their centre of power in al-Ahsa, with the intention of starting a new era in Islam.

Religious significance

Etymologically, the Arabic word (قبلة) means "direction". In Islamic ritual and law, it refers to a special direction faced by Muslims during prayers and other religious contexts. Islamic religious scholars agree that facing the qibla is a necessary condition for the validity of salah—the Islamic ritual prayer—in normal conditions; exceptions include prayers during a state of fear or war, as well as non-obligatory prayers during travel. The hadith (Muhammad's tradition) also prescribes that Muslims face the qibla when entering the (sacred state for hajj), after the middle  (stone-throwing ritual) during the pilgrimage. Islamic etiquette calls for Muslims to turn the head of an animal when it is slaughtered, and the faces of the dead when they are buried, toward the qibla. The qibla is the preferred direction when making a supplication and is to be avoided when defecating, urinating, and spitting.

Inside a mosque, the qibla is usually indicated by a, a niche in its qibla-facing wall. In a congregational prayer, the imam stands in it or close to it, in front of the rest of the congregation. The became a part of the mosque during the Umayyad period and its form was standardised during the Abbasid period; before that, the qibla of a mosque was known from the orientation of one of its walls, called the qibla wall. The term  itself is attested only once in the Quran, but it refers to a place of prayer of the Israelites rather than a part of a mosque. The Amr ibn al-As Mosque in Fustat, Egypt, one of the oldest mosques, is known to have been built originally without a , though one has since been added.

and
("standing so as to face the Kaaba head-on") is a position facing the qibla so that an imaginary line extending from the person's line of sight would pass through the Kaaba. This manner of observing the qibla is easily done inside the Great Mosque of Mecca and its surroundings, but given that the Kaaba is less than 20 m wide, this is virtually impossible from distant locations. For example, from Medina, with a 338 km straight-line distance from the Kaaba, a one-degree deviation from the precise imaginary line—an error hardly noticeable when setting one's prayer mat or assuming one's posture—results in a 5.9 km shift from the site of the Kaaba. This effect is amplified when further than Mecca: from Jakarta, Indonesia—some 7900 km away, a one-degree deviation causes more than a 100 km shift, and even an arc second's deviation—($1/3600$ of a degree)—causes a more than 100 m shift from the location of the Kaaba. In comparison, the construction process of a mosque can easily introduce an error of up to five degrees from the calculated qibla, and the installation of prayer rugs inside the mosque as indicators for worshipers can add another deviation of five degrees from the mosque's orientation.

A minority of Islamic religious scholars—for example Ibn Arabi —consider  to be obligatory during the ritual prayer, while others consider it obligatory only when one is able. For locations further than Mecca, scholars such as Abu Hanifa and Al-Qurtubi  argue that it is permissible to assume, facing only the general direction of the Kaaba. Others argue that the ritual condition of facing the qibla is already fulfilled when the imaginary line to the Kaaba is within one's field of vision. For instance, there are legal opinions that accept the entire southeastern quadrant in Al-Andalus (Islamic Iberian Peninsula), and the southwestern quadrant in Central Asia, to be valid qibla. Arguments for the validity of ' include the wording of the Quran, which commands Muslims only to "turn [one's] face" toward the Great Mosque, and to avoid imposing requirements that would be impossible to fulfill if ' were to be obligatory in all places. The Shafi'i school of Islamic law, as codified in Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi's 11th-century , argues that one must follow the qibla indicated by the local mosque when one is not near Mecca or, when not near a mosque, to ask a trustworthy person. When this is not possible, one is to make one's own determination—to exercise —by the means at one's disposal.

Theoretical basis: the great circle

A great circle, also called the orthodrome, is any circle on a sphere whose centre is identical to the centre of the sphere. For example, all lines of longitude are great circles of the Earth, while the equator is the only line of latitude that is also a great circle (other lines of latitude are centered north or south of the centre of the Earth). The great circle is the theoretical basis in most models that seek to mathematically determine the direction of the qibla from a locality. In such models, the qibla is defined as the direction of the great circle passing through the locality and the Kaaba. One of the properties of a great circle is that it indicates the shortest path connecting any pair of points along the circle—this is the basis of its use to determine the qibla. The great circle is similarly used to find the shortest flight path connecting the two locations—therefore the qibla calculated using the great circle method is generally close to the direction of the locality to Mecca. As the ellipsoid is a more accurate figure of the Earth than a perfect sphere, modern researchers have looked into using ellipsoidal models to calculate the qibla, replacing the great circle by the geodesics on an ellipsoid. This results in more complicated calculations, while the improvement in accuracy falls well within the typical precision of the setting out of a mosque or the placement of a mat. For example, calculations using the GRS 80 ellipsoidal model yields the qibla of 18°47′06″ for a location in San Francisco, while the great circle method yields 18°51′05″.

Calculations with spherical trigonometry
The great circle model is applied to calculate the qibla using spherical trigonometry—a branch of geometry that deals with the mathematical relations between the sides and angles of triangles formed by three great circles of a sphere (as opposed to the conventional trigonometry which deals with those of a two-dimensional triangle).

If a location $$O$$, the Kaaba $$Q$$, and the north pole $$N$$ form a triangle on the sphere of the Earth, then the qibla is indicated by $$OQ$$, which is the direction of the great circle passing through both $$O$$ and $$Q$$. The qibla can also be expressed as an angle, $$\angle NOQ$$ (or $$\angle q$$), of the qibla with respect to the north, also called the inhiraf al-qibla. This angle can be calculated as a mathematical function of the local latitude $$\phi$$, the latitude of the Kaaba $$\phi_Q$$, and the longitude difference between the locality and the Kaaba $$\Delta L$$. This function is derived from the cotangent rule which applies to any spherical triangle with angles $$A$$, $$B$$, $$C$$ and sides $$a$$, $$b$$, $$c$$:

$$\cos a\,\cos C=\cot b\,\sin a - \cot B \,\sin C$$

Applying this formula in the spherical triangle $$\triangle NOQ$$ (substituting $$B = \angle q = \angle NOQ$$) and applying trigonometric identities obtain:

$$\tan q = \frac{\sin \Delta L}{\sin \phi \cos \Delta L - \cos \phi \tan \phi_Q}$$, or

$$q = \arctan \left( \frac{\sin \Delta L}{\sin \phi \cos \Delta L - \cos \phi \tan \phi_Q}\right)$$

This formula was derived by modern scholars, but equivalent methods have been known to Muslim astronomers since the 9th century (3rd century AH), developed by various scholars, including Habash al-Hasib (active in Damascus and Baghdad c. 850), Al-Nayrizi (Baghdad, c. 900), Ibn Yunus (10th–11th century), Ibn al-Haytham (11th century), and Al-Biruni (11th century). Today spherical trigonometry also underlies nearly all applications or websites which calculate the qibla.

When the qibla angle with respect to the north, $$\angle q$$, is known, true north needs to be known to find the qibla in practice. Common practical methods to find it include the observation of the shadow at the culmination of the sun—when the sun crosses exactly the local meridian. At this point, any vertical object would cast a shadow oriented in the north–south direction. The result of this observation is very accurate, but it requires an accurate determination of the local time of culmination as well as making the correct observation at that exact moment. Another common method is using the compass, which is more practical because it can be done at any time; the disadvantage is that the north indicated by a magnetic compass differs from true north. This magnetic declination can measure up to 20°, which can vary in different places on Earth and changes over time.

Shadow observation

As observed from Earth, the Sun appears to "shift" between the Northern and Southern Tropics seasonally; additionally, it appears to move from east to west daily as a consequence of the Earth's rotation. The combination of these two apparent motions means that every day the Sun crosses the meridian once, usually not precisely overhead but to the north or to the south of the observer. In locations between the two tropics—latitudes lower than 23.5° north or south—at certain moments of the year (usually twice a year) the Sun passes almost directly overhead. This happens when the Sun crosses the meridian while being at the local latitude at the same time.

The city of Mecca is among the places where this occurs, due to its location at 21°25′ N. It occurs twice a year, firstly on 27/28 May at about 12:18 Saudi Arabia Standard Time (SAST) or 09:18 UTC, and secondly on 15/16 July at 12:27 SAST (09:27 UTC). As the sun reaches the zenith of the Kaaba, any vertical object on earth that receives sunlight cast a shadow that indicates the qibla (see picture). This method of finding the qibla is called ("observing the qibla"). Since night falls on the hemisphere opposite of the Kaaba, half the locations on Earth (including Australia as well as most of the Americas and the Pacific Ocean) cannot observe this directly. Instead, such places observe the opposite phenomenon when the Sun passes above the antipodal point of the Kaaba (in other words, the Sun passes directly underneath the Kaaba), causing shadows in the opposite direction from those observed during . This occurs twice a year, on 14 January 00:30 SAST (21:30 UTC the previous day) and 29 November 00:09 SAST (21:09 UTC the previous day). Observations made within five minutes of the  moments or its antipodal counterparts, or at the same time of the day two days before or after each event, still show accurate directions with negligible difference.

On the world map

Spherical trigonometry provides the shortest path from any point on Earth to the Kaaba, even though the indicated direction might seem counterintuitive when imagined on a flat world map. For example, the qibla from Alaska obtained through spherical trigonometry is almost due north. This apparent counter-intuitiveness is caused by projections used by world maps, which by necessity distort the surface of the Earth. A straight line shown by the world map in using the Mercator projection is called the rhumb line or the loxodrome, which is used to indicate the qibla by a minority of Muslims. It can result in a dramatic difference in some places; for example, in some parts of North America the flat map shows Mecca in the southeast while the great circle calculation shows it to the northeast. In Japan the map shows it to the southwest, while the great circle shows it to the northwest. The majority of Muslims, however, follow the great circle method.

A retroazimuthal projection is any map projection which preserves the angular direction (the azimuth) of the great circle path from any point of the map to a point selected as the center of the map. The initial purpose of its development was to help finding the qibla, by choosing the Kaaba as the center point. The earliest surviving works using this projection were two astrolabe-shaped brass instruments created in 18th-century Iran. They contain grids covering locations between Spain and China, label the locations of major cities along with their names, but do not show any coastline. The first of the two was discovered in 1989; its diameter is 22.5 cm and it has a ruler with which one can read the direction of Mecca from the markings on the instrument's circumference, and the distance to Mecca from the markings on the ruler. Only the second one is signed by its creator, Muhammad Husayn. The first formal design of a retroazimuthal projection in the Western literature is the Craig projection or the Mecca projection, created by the Scottish mathematician James Ireland Craig, who worked at the Survey Department of Egypt, in 1910. His map is centered in Mecca and its range is limited to show the predominantly Muslim lands. Extending the map further than 90° in longitude from the center will result in crowding and overlaps.

Traditional methods
Historical records and surviving old mosques show that throughout history the qibla was often determined by simple methods based on tradition or "folk science" not based on mathematical astronomy. Some early Muslims used due south everywhere as the qibla, literally following Muhammad's instruction to face south while he was in Medina (Mecca is due south of Medina). Some mosques as far away as al-Andalus to the west and Central Asia to the east face south, even though Mecca is nowhere near that direction. In various places, there are also the "qiblas of the companions", those which were used there by the Companions of the Prophet—the first generation of Muslims, who are considered role models in Islam. Such directions were used by some Muslims in the following centuries, side by side with other directions, even after Muslim astronomers used calculations to find more accurate directions to Mecca. Among the directions described as the qiblas of the companions are due south in Syria and Palestine, the direction of the winter sunrise in Egypt, and the direction of the winter sunset in Iraq. The direction of the winter sunrise and sunset are also traditionally favoured because they are parallel to the walls of the Kaaba.

Pre-astronomy
The determination of qibla has been an important problem for Muslim communities throughout history. Muslims are required to know the qibla to perform their daily prayers, and it is also needed to determine the orientation of mosques. When Muhammad lived among the Muslims in Medina (which, like Mecca, is also in the Hejaz region), he prayed due south, according to the known direction of Mecca. Within the few generations after Muhammad's death in 632, Muslims had reached places far away from Mecca, presenting the problem of determining the qibla in new locations. Mathematical methods based on astronomy would develop only at the end of the 8th century or the beginning of the 9th, and even then they were not initially popular. Therefore, early Muslims relied on non-astronomical methods.

There was a wide range of traditional methods in determining the qibla during the early Islamic period, resulting in different directions even from the same place. In addition to due south and the qiblas of the companions, the Arabs also knew a form of "folk" astronomy—called so by the historian of astronomy David A. King to distinguish it from conventional astronomy, which is an exact science—originating from pre-Islamic traditions. It used natural phenomenon, including the observation of the Sun, the Moon, the stars, and wind, without any basis in mathematics. These methods yield specific directions in individual localities, often using the fixed setting and rising points of a specific star, the sunrise or sunset at the equinoxes, or at the summer or the winter solstices. Historical sources record several such qiblas, for example: sunrise at the equinoxes (due east) in the Maghreb, sunset at the equinoxes (due west) in India, the origin of the north wind or the fixed location of the North Star in Yemen, the rising point of the star (Canopus) in Syria, and the midwinter sunset in Iraq. Such directions appear in texts of (Islamic jurisprudence) and texts of folk astronomy. Astronomers (aside from folk astronomers) typically do not comment on these methods, but they were not opposed by Islamic legal scholars. The traditional directions were still in use when methods were developed to calculate the qibla more accurately, and they still appear in some surviving medieval mosques today.

With astronomy

The study of astronomy—known as ("science of the celestial orbs") in the Islamic intellectual tradition—began to appear in the Islamic World in the second half of the 8th century, centred in Baghdad, the principal city of the Abbasid Caliphate. Initially, the science was introduced through the works of Indian authors, but after the 9th century the works of Greek astronomers such as Ptolemy were translated into Arabic and became the main references in the field. Muslim astronomers preferred Greek astronomy because they considered it to be better supported by theoretical explanations and therefore it could be developed as an exact science; however, the influence of Indian astronomy survives especially in the compilation of astronomical tables. This new science was applied to develop new methods of determining the qibla, making use of the concept of latitude and longitude taken from Ptolemy's Geography as well as trigonometric formulae developed by Muslim scholars. Most textbooks of astronomy written in the medieval Islamic World contain a chapter on the determination of the qibla, considered one of the many things connecting astronomy with Islamic law (sharia). According to David A. King, various medieval solutions for the determination of the qibla "bear witness to the development of mathematical methods from the 3rd/9th to the 8th/14th centuries and to the level of sophistication in trigonometry and computational techniques attained by these scholars".

The first mathematical methods developed in the early 9th century were approximate solutions to the mathematical problem, usually using a flat map or two-dimensional geometry. Since in reality the Earth is spherical, the directions found were inexact, but they were sufficient for locations relatively close to Mecca (including as far away as Egypt and Iran) because the errors were less than 2°.

Exact solutions, based on three-dimensional geometry and spherical trigonometry, began to appear in the mid-9th century. Habash al-Hasib wrote an early example, using an orthographic projection. Another group of solutions uses trigonometric formulas, for example Al-Nayrizi's four-step application of Menelaus's theorem. Subsequent scholars, including Ibn Yunus, Abu al-Wafa, Ibn al-Haitham and Al-Biruni, proposed other methods which are confirmed to be accurate from the viewpoint of modern astronomy.

Muslim astronomers subsequently used these methods to compile tables showing the qibla from a list of locations, grouped by their latitude and longitude differences from Mecca. The oldest known example, from c. 9th-century Baghdad, contained entries for each degree and arc minute up to 20°. In the 14th century, Shams al-Din al-Khalili, an astronomer who served as a (timekeeper) in the Umayyad Mosque of Damascus, compiled a qibla table for 2,880 coordinates with longitude differences of up to 60° from Mecca, and with latitudes ranging from 10° to 50°. King opines that among the medieval qibla tables, al-Khalili's work is "the most impressive from the view of its scope and its accuracy".

The accuracy of applying these methods to actual locations depend on the accuracy of its input parameters—the local latitude and the latitude of Mecca, and the longitude difference. At the time of the development of these methods, the latitude of a location could be determined to several arc minutes' accuracy, but there was no accurate method to determine a location's longitude. Common methods used to estimate the longitude difference included comparing the local timing of a lunar eclipse versus the timing in Mecca, or measuring the distance of caravan routes; the Central Asian scholar Al-Biruni made his estimate by averaging various approximate methods. Because of longitudinal inaccuracy, medieval qibla calculations (including those using mathematically accurate methods) differ from the modern values. For example, while the Al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo was built using the "qibla of the astronomers", but the mosque's qibla (127°) differs somewhat from the results of modern calculations (135°) because the longitude difference used was off by three degrees.

Accurate longitude values in the Islamic world were available only after the application of cartographic surveys in the 18th and 19th centuries. Modern coordinates, along with new technologies such as GPS satellites and electronic instruments, resulted in the development of practical instruments to calculate the qibla. The qibla found using modern instruments might differ from the direction of mosques, because a mosque might be built before the advent of modern data, and orientation inaccuracies might have been introduced during the building process of modern mosques. When this is known, sometimes the direction of the mosque's mihrab is still observed, and sometimes a marker is added (such as lines drawn in the mosque) that can be followed instead of the mihrab.

Instruments
Muslims use various instruments to find the qibla direction when not near a mosque. The qibla compass is a magnetic compass which includes a table or a list of qibla angles from major settlements. Some electronic versions use satellite coordinates to calculate and indicate the qibla automatically. Qibla compasses have existed since around 1300, supplemented by the list of qibla angles often written on the instruments themselves. Hotel rooms with Muslim guests may use a sticker showing the qibla on the ceiling or a drawer. With the advent of computing, various mobile apps and websites use formulae to calculate the qibla for their users.

Early Islamic world
Because varying methods have been used to determine the qibla, mosques were built throughout history in different directions, including some that still stand today. Methods based on astronomy and mathematics were not always used, and the same determination method could yield different qiblas due to differences in the accuracy of data and calculations. Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi (d. 1442) recorded various qibla angles used in Cairo at the time: 90° (due east), 117° (winter sunrise, the "qibla of the sahaba"), 127° (calculated by astronomers, such as Ibn Yunus), 141° (Mosque of Ibn Tulun), 156° (the rising point of Suhayl/Canopus), 180° (due south, emulating the qibla of Muhammad in Medina), and 204° (the setting point of Canopus). The modern qibla for Cairo is 135°, which was not known at the time. This diversity also results in the non-uniform layout in Cairo's districts, because the streets are often oriented according to the varying orientation of the mosques. Historical records also indicate the diversity of qiblas in other major cities, including Córdoba (113°, 120°, 135°, 150°, and 180° were recorded in the 12th century) and Samarkand (180°, 225°, 230°, 240°, and 270° were recorded in the 11th century). According to the doctrine of, the diverse directions of qiblas are still valid as long as they are still in the same broad direction.

In 1990, the scholar of geography Michael E. Bonine conducted a survey of the main mosques of all major cities in present-day Morocco—constructed from the Idrisid period (8th–10th centuries) up to the Alaouite period (17th century to present). While modern calculations yield the qiblas of between 91° (almost due east) in Marrakesh and 97° in Tangier, only mosques constructed in the Alaouite period are constructed with qiblas relatively close to this range. The qibla of older mosques vary considerably, with concentrations occurring between 155°–160° (slightly east of south) as well as 120°–130° (almost southeast). In 2008, Bonine also published a survey of the main city mosques of Tunisia, in which he found that most were aligned close to 147°. This is the direction of the Great Mosque of Kairouan, originally built in 670 and last rebuilt by the Aghlabids in 862, which is often credited as the model used by the other mosques. Among the mosques surveyed, the Great Mosque of Sousse was the only one with a significant difference, facing further south at 163°. The actual direction to Mecca as calculated using the great circle method ranges from 110° to 113° throughout the country.

Indonesia
Variations of the qibla also occur in Indonesia, the country with the world's largest Muslim population. The astronomically calculated qibla ranges from 291°—295° (21°—25° north of west) depending on the exact location in the archipelago. However, the qibla is often known traditionally simply as "the west", resulting in mosques built oriented due west or to the direction of sunset—which varies slightly throughout the year. Different opinions exist among Indonesian Islamic astronomers: Tono Saksono et al. argues in 2018 that facing the qibla during prayers is more of a "spiritual prerequisite" than a precise physical one, and that an exact direction to the Kaaba itself from thousands of kilometres away requires an extreme precision impossible to achieve when building a mosque or when standing for prayers. On the other hand, Muhammad Hadi Bashori in 2014 opines that "correcting the qibla is indeed a very urgent thing", and can be guided by simple methods such as observing the shadow.

In the history of the region, disputes about the qibla had also occurred in the then-Dutch East Indies in the 1890s. When the Indonesian scholar and future founder of Muhammadiyah, Ahmad Dahlan, returned from his Islamic and astronomy studies in Mecca, he found that mosques in the royal capital of Yogyakarta had inaccurate qiblas, including the Kauman Great Mosque, which faced due west. His efforts in adjusting the qibla were opposed by the traditional ulama of the Yogyakarta Sultanate, and a new mosque built by Dahlan using his calculations was demolished by a mob. Dahlan rebuilt his mosque in the 1900s, and later the Kauman Great Mosque would also be reoriented using the astronomically calculated qibla.

North America

Places long settled by Muslim populations tend to have resolved the question of the direction of the qibla over time. Other countries, like the United States and Canada, have had large Muslim communities only in the past several decades, and the determination of the qibla can be a matter of debate. The Islamic Center of Washington, D.C. was built in 1953 facing slightly north of east and initially puzzled some observers, including Muslims, because Washington, D.C.'s latitude is 17°30′ north of Mecca. Even though a line drawn on world maps—such as those using the Mercator projection—would suggest a southeastern direction to Mecca, the astronomical calculation using the great circle method does yield a north-of-east direction (56°33′). Nevertheless, most early mosques in the United States face east or southeast, following the apparent direction on world maps. As the Muslim community grew and the number of mosques increased, in 1978, an American Muslim scientist, S. Kamal Abdali, wrote a book arguing that the correct qibla from North America was north or northeast as calculated by the great circle method which identifies the shortest path to Mecca. Abdali's conclusion was widely circulated and then accepted by the Muslim community, and mosques were subsequently reoriented as a result. In 1993, two religious scholars, Riad Nachef and Samir Kadi, published a book arguing for a southeastern qibla, writing that the north/northeast qibla was invalid and resulted from a lack of religious knowledge. In reaction, Abdali published a response to their arguments and criticism in an article entitled "The Correct Qibla" online in 1997. The two opinions resulted in a period of debate about the correct qibla. Eventually most North American Muslims accepted the north/northeast qibla with a minority following the east/southeast qibla.

Outer space

The International Space Station (ISS) orbits the Earth at high speed—the direction from it to Mecca changes significantly within a few seconds. Before his flight to the ISS, Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor requested, and the Malaysian National Fatwa Council provided, guidelines which have been translated into multiple languages. The council wrote that the qibla determination should be "based on what is possible" and recommended four options, saying that one should pray toward the first option if possible and, if not, fall back successively on the later ones:
 * 1) the Kaaba itself
 * 2) the position directly above the Kaaba at the altitude of the astronaut's orbit
 * 3) the Earth in general
 * 4) "wherever"

In line with the fatwa council, other Muslim scholars argue for the importance of flexibility and adapting the qibla requirement to what an astronaut is capable of fulfilling. Khaleel Muhammad of San Diego State University opined "God does not take a person to task for that which is beyond his/her ability to work with." Kamal Abdali argued that concentration during a prayer is more important than the exact orientation, and he suggested keeping the qibla direction at the start of a prayer instead of "worrying about possible changes in position". Before Sheikh Muszaphar's mission, at least eight Muslims had flown to space, but none of them publicly discussed issues relating to worship in space.

title: Qibla


text:
Sex life

In human sexuality, a sex life is a sector of a person's day-to-day existence which may involve sexual activity or represent the absence of sexual activity. In general parlance, the term can have many sub-meanings and social layers, but generally includes the following:

 * The individual is able to, on an either regular or semi-regular basis, enter into voluntarily agreed and consensual situations involving partnered sexual activity, i.e. an activity other than solo masturbation. This would inherently mean there is at least one other person per situation, with or without sexual activity, and regardless of whether or not these situations are sexually monogamous; i.e., a "sex life" can be had just as easily with a long-term sexual partner as it can with multiple partners in rapid succession over a lifetime. The idea of a 'regularly or semi-regularly' sex life varies, but categorizing an individual who is involuntarily celibate (as opposed to voluntary abstinence) as having a sex life may be inaccurate.
 * Presuming the above is true by default, the individual who has a sex life is then able to explore and deepen their existing sexual skills and also, when they desire it, is able to have the opportunity to learn new ones and to "grow" as a sexual being.
 * The individual is able, because of these factors, to have an "area" of their overall "life" that involves sex in a way that is somewhat similar to how athletes have an "area" of their lives that involves sports or how musicians have an "area" of their lives that involves music. A person with a secure and constantly developing sex life is inherently able to regard their sexuality as an active part of themselves, and although a secure sex life does not necessarily mean that the person will always feel self-confident or sexually attractive, consistent access to sex and the ability to deepen and broaden one's sexual skills provides a certain psychological assurance of sex appeal that people who do not have a "sex life" tend not to have.

Sex frequency
Several sources say that in humans, frequency of sexual intercourse might range from 0 to 20 times a week. In the United States, the average frequency of sexual intercourse for married couples is 2 to 3 times a week. It is generally recognized that postmenopausal women experience declines in frequency of sexual intercourse and that average frequency of intercourse declines with age. According to the Kinsey Institute, average frequency of sexual intercourse in US is 112 times per year (age 18–29), 86 times per year (age 30–39), and 69 times per year (age 40–49).

In a number of sexual harassment cases, certain employees and others have been asked about their sex lives, often repeatedly, including in a case filed against Mitsubishi Motor Manufacturing of America by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

title: Sex life