texts: Association in the winter of 1991: he was a territorial draft pick for the Music City Jammers and started the season there, averaging 11.6 points per game, and was then was traded to the Louisville Shooters in December, making his debut on December 11, 1991 scoring 14 points against the Albany Sharp Shooters. In the month of February 1992 he was traded to the Albany Sharp Shooters. However, he did not play for Albany and moved to Europe instead, signing for Italian club Basket Rimini: he debuted against Philips Milano scoring 44 points in 38 minutes of play. After 4 games (during which he averaged 32.5 points per game) he was dismissed from the team. In 1993 Eubanks joined the Halifax Windjammers in the newly formed National Basketball League; he also played for the Winnipeg Thunder. He signed for Greek team Sporting B.C., briefly playing there before moving back to the United States, joining the Tri-City Chinook in the CBA: after 8 games averaging 5.3 points, 2.1 rebounds and 0.3 assists in 12.6 minutes per game, he signed for the Rockford Lightning, where he posted averages of 6 points and 1 rebound per game in 19.5 minutes of playing time.In the summer of 1994 he participated in the Indiana Pacers rookie-free agent camp in the summer of 1994, averaging 16 points in 15 minutes per game during preseason games, but he did not make the final roster for the 1994–95 NBA season. In 1994 <mask> signed for Israeli club Maccabi Ramat Gan. On October 9, 1994 he scored 101 points during an Israeli league game between Maccabi Ramat Gan and Beitar Ramat Gan, shooting 40/57 from the field (9/22 from the three-point line) and 12/14 on free throws. He set a single-game scoring record for the league and became one of the players to score 100 or more points in a


type: original

texts: game. He played 26 games in the season, averaging 5.9 rebounds, 1.5 assists and a league-leading 30.9 points per game, shooting 43% from three and 92% from the free throw line. The following season he joined Hapoel Eilat, and played 22 games in the 1995–96 season, averaging 22.4 points, 4.8 rebounds and 1.7 assists shooting 43% from three and 83% on free throws. In 1996 he left Israel and played two years in Japan with Toyota Motors Pacers; he then joined Puerto Rican side Gallitos de Isabela.In 1999 he moved to Argentina, where he signed for Estudiantes de Olavarría. In his first season he led the league in scoring, averaging 25.9 points in 41 games (1,060 total points), and won the league title. In the 1999–2000 season he led the LNB in scoring again, averaging 27.5 points in 55 games (1,514 total points, one of the best results in LNB history). On November 14, 1999 Eubanks scored 55 points against Andino in a 109–83 win, shooting 19/25 (7/9 from the three-point range) and 10/11 on free throws. At the end of the season he won his second personal championship, was named the top scorer, and received the LNB Best Foreign Player award. He left Argentina for Venezuela in 2000, joining Cocodrilos de Caracas: he then signed for Atenas, and played part of the 2001–02 season there, thus winning his second LNB championship. In 2001 he also played in Cyprus for AEL Limassol: in February 2001 he scored 84 points in a 152–73 win against PAEEK, beating the previous league record of 75 that had been established by Tony Harris in 1995.Eubanks returned to Italy to play for Viola Reggio Calabria, and debuted for the team on the 13th round, playing against DeVizia Avellino, scoring 12 points. He played 25 games that season (24 starts), averaging 18.8 points and 3.8


texts:
 rebounds per game, shooting 38.4% from three and 88.8% from the free throw line. In the following season he was second in the league in scoring with 19.6 points per game behind Boris Gorenc of Metis Varese. That year he shot 40% from three and 92.9% from the free throw line. He then started the 2003–04 season with Viola, and then moved to Israel again: he retired after one last game in Israel for Ironi Ramat Gan, scoring 19 points and recording 6 rebounds and 1 assist in 31 minutes of play. References

External links
Career stats at ProBallers.com
Profile at RealGM.com
College stats at Sports-Reference.com
 Italian league stats
Israeli league stats

1968 births
Living people
African-American basketball players
American expatriate basketball people in Argentina
American expatriate basketball people in Canada
American expatriate basketball people in Cyprus
American expatriate basketball people in Greece
American expatriate basketball people in Israel
American expatriate basketball people in Italy
American expatriate basketball people in Japan
American expatriate basketball people in Venezuela
American men's basketball players
AEL Limassol B.C. players
Alvark Tokyo players
Atenas basketball players
Basket Rimini Crabs players
Basketball players from Louisville, Kentucky
Cocodrilos de Caracas players
Estudiantes de Olavarría basketball players
Hapoel Eilat basketball players
Ironi Ramat Gan players
Israeli Basketball Premier League players
Lega Basket Serie A players
Rockford Lightning players
Seneca High School (Louisville, Kentucky) alumni
Shooting guards
Small forwards
Sporting basketball players
Tennessee State Tigers basketball players
Tri-City Chinook players
Viola Reggio Calabria players
21st-century African-American people
20th-century


texts:
<mask><mask> is an American lawyer and business executive. Until June 2018, he was vice president of global communications, marketing, and public policy at Facebook, where he directed the company's government affairs and public relations efforts. Life and education
<mask> was born to a Jewish family and holds degrees from Harvard Law School (J.D. 1986), the John F. Kennedy School of Government (M.P.P. 1986), and Harvard College (A.B. 1981). He also studied at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, France.Career

Early career
Schrage began his legal career with Sullivan & Cromwell, where he specialized in U.S. securities offerings, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate transactions, including project financing for the Euro Disneyland theme park. He then worked as managing director of the New York office of Clark & Weinstock, a public policy and management consulting firm. Since 1990, Schrage also served as adjunct professor at Columbia Business School, where he taught a seminar that "explores the intersection of international human rights law and multinational business practices", and Columbia Law School. Schrage served as the Bernard L. Schwarz Senior Fellow in Business and Foreign Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations and also worked at Gap, Inc., as the senior vice president for global communications. Google
On October 31, 2005, it was announced that Schrage had joined Google as Vice President, Global Communications and Public Affairs. Upon joining Google, Schrage inherited the company's controversy regarding censoring search results in China. On February 15, 2006, he testified in front of the United States House Committee on International Relations on behalf of Google on the subject of Internet in the People's Republic of China.Facebook
On May 12, 2010, The New York Times published a Q&A with Schrage, where he answered readers' questions. The interview was panned and negatively rated in the press, with Schrage attracting criticism for his poor handling of Facebook's privacy policies. In 2018, it was reported that Schrage tasked a Republican-affiliated PR firm to push negative narratives about

masks:
Elliot J
. Schrage
Schrage


texts:
 Facebook's competitors, namely Apple and Google. On June 14, 2018, he announced his intention to resign from his position at Facebook. Schrage was succeeded by former British Deputy Prime Minister and leader of the Liberal Democrats Nick Clegg. Human rights advocacy
Schrage worked for such groups as Human Rights First, Human Rights Watch and the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial. Schrage helped to create, and co-taught, the first stand-alone course dedicated to exploring the human rights responsibilities of global business at Columbia Business School in the early 1990s.Later, the course was also offered at Columbia Law School and the School of International Public Affairs. Schrage advised various international corporations and trade associations, assisting them in developing corporate "codes of conduct" on human rights. Alongside the development of mechanisms to monitor human rights compliance, he assisted these bodies in evaluating the efficacy of their monitoring programs. In 1992–93, Schrage created and served as the first director of the Liaison Office on Human Rights and Environment for The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (now Human Rights First), one of the first programs to investigate connections between the growing US movement for environmental justice and international human rights obligations. In 1996, Schrage helped organize a partnership between three organizations; UNICEF, the ILO and Save the Children. The purpose of the partnership was to end child labor in soccer ball production in Pakistan. At that time Pakistan was the source for three of every four balls produced each year.A further project was announced to address the same problems regarding labor and production in India. From 2000-1, Schrage served as Senior Vice President of Global Affairs for Gap Inc. Schrage’s position required him to manage the social responsibility initiatives of the company. As part of this role he oversaw engagement programs for company stakeholders, which included various social investors, NGOs and government officials. Furthermore, he was tasked with auditing the working conditions for factory workers who manufactured


texts:
 goods for the Gap, Old Navy and Banana Republic brands, through the set up and direction of a new body for Gap, entitled Gap’s Global Compliance Organization. He led study groups on Judging Corporate Liability in the Global Economy, Leveraging the Power of the Privat Sector in the Middle East and North Africa and Beyond the Letter of the Law: The Global Impact of Compliance as a Foreign Policy Tool. His work on the application of the Alien Tort Statute was cited by the U.S. Supreme Court in its analyses of potential liability for multinational corporations for complicity in human rights abuses in the countries where they do business. He also advised the American Apparel Manufacturers Association in developing the Worldwide Responsible Apparel Production (WRAP) Certification Program, a global program to certify apparel factories that comply with human rights standards.Schrage has served on the American Association for the Advancement of Science's Committee on Scientific Freedom and Human Rights, and the U.S. Department of Treasury Advisory Committee on International Child Labor Enforcement and is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations. His board experience includes serving as a trustee of the Harvard Law School Association of New York, Director of the International League for Human Rights, and the Director of the Medicare Beneficiaries Defense Fund (now Medicare Rights Center). He was twice appointed by President Obama to serve as Trustee of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Personal life
Schrage, his wife, and his children reside in San Francisco, California. Selected publications
 Paper Laws, Steel Bayonets: Breakdown of the Rule of Law in Haiti, Human Rights First, 1990. References

Columbia Law School faculty
Columbia Business School faculty
Facebook employees
Harvard Law School alumni
Harvard Kennedy School alumni
20th-century American Jews
Living people
1960 births
Google employees
Corporate lawyers
American lawyers
20th-century American businesspeople
21st-century American businesspeople
American business executives
Sullivan & Cromwell people
Harvard College alumni
21st-century


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<mask> (1912–1976) was an American transgender activist, artist, writer and lecturer. During the mid-20th Century, she organized a network of gender non-conforming people across the US and abroad, and advocated for transgender issues. She was an early founder of the magazine, Transvestia. Academic and historian Susan Stryker has written, "If there is an unheralded founder of the transgender community in the United States, it’s <mask>.". Personal life
<mask> was born in 1912 and was assigned male-at-birth. She began cross-dressing at a young age and would wear her mother's clothes. In 1930, she married and, when she was twenty-two, had a daughter named Anne.After the death of her first wife, she married a woman who at first accepted her cross-dressing, but they divorced three years later. After the divorce, circa 1942 to 1944, <mask> lived full-time as a woman in Berkeley and later in San Francisco. Of her transition, <mask> wrote in one of her journals:"I consider <mask> to be my true identity even though the birth records say differently. And on this I will stand. For to me, as to most people who know me, I AM <mask>. "Although she considered gender reassignment surgery, she chose not to pursue it, and instead experimented with hormone treatment, under the guidance of Harry Benjamin. She wrote, "I firmly believe that most transvestites have that same urge [for a sex change] but in varying degrees and areas”

<mask> was also an artist, who sold paintings.She wrote a 117-page autobiography entitled “Lawrence Autobiography” and a shorter text entitled, “Lawrence Autobiography 1948-1957”, both of which are unpublished and housed at the <mask> Collection in the Kinsey Institute Archives. Community organizing
Throughout her life, <mask> corresponded with and built an

masks:
Louise Lawrence
Louise Lawrence
Lawrence
Lawrence
Lawrence
Louise
Louise
Lawrence
Louise Lawrence
Lawrence


texts:
 extensive network of transgender people across the Bay Area, the US, and globally, by placing personal ads in magazines and contacting people who had been arrested for cross-dressing. Through <mask>'s network, members connected and collectivized, sharing information about doctors, medical procedures and comparing surgical results. She was known to house transgender people, including those who had traveled to seek surgery in San Francisco. Her network also included gay female impersonators, drag queens, April Ashley and Arthur Corbett. <mask> was a member of the Mattachine Society of San Francisco and affiliated with the homophile movement in San Francisco. In 1964, <mask>, Jose Sarria and four other homophile leaders met with religious leaders to advocate for sexual minorities.In 1942, Virginia Prince visited <mask> after Prince attended one of <mask>'s lectures. <mask> subsequently introduced Prince to her colleagues in transgender-oriented medical research and Prince would later become a leading transgender activist. In 1952, Lawrence helped to publish, along with Prince and others, the newsletter "Transvestia: Journal of the American Society for Equality in Dress", which hoped to combat discrimination against cross-dressers and educate researchers about transvestism. Although the publication was grown by Virginia Prince after 1960, the paper's first edition was largely funded by and distributed to the people in <mask>'s network. Medical community
From the 1940s until her death, <mask> sought to educate the public about gender non-conformity. To achieve this, she acted as a key interface between medical researchers and her network within the transgender community. She wrote, "I am trying to gather as much information... as possible in order that medical men... will be

masks: Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence


texts: able to help people that come to them."In 1942, she met leading psychiatrist Karl Bowman, the Director of the Langley Porter Psychiatric Clinic at University of California - San Francisco. She frequently lectured on transgender topics to Bowman's colleagues at the university. Through Bowman, <mask> met Harry Benjamin, a researcher in transsexual medicine from Germany, and introduced him to her contacts in the transgender community. According to former colleagues, Benjamin used <mask> as a "sounding board for many of his ideas" and <mask> wrote that she appreciated Benjamin as "one of the few medical men in this country who has any understanding of this problem." <mask> also informed him of the early writings of David O. Cauldwell. <mask> worked closely with Alfred Kinsey, a key figure in sexology. In a letter to Harry Benjamin, she recounted:"In talking to Dr. Kinsey I brought up .. . my interest in transvestism . . . and to my surprise he said that he thought the problem was relatively rare. . . . I am very sure that it is much more common than most of us, even prominent doctors, are willing or able to admit... I was going to try and prove to him that I was right and he encouraged me by saying that any facts or figures I could contribute would be valuable. "By 1950, Kinsey had employed <mask> to type the life histories of her acquaintances and to copy out manuscripts of transvestite fiction, especially an underground genre known as "petticoat discipline". <mask> encouraged her transgender peers to be interviewed by Kinsey for his research. When she shared with him her list of trans contacts in 1954, the list included nineteen people in the Bay Area and one hundred and fifty-two nationwide.She sent him a collected scrapbook of newspaper clippings, along with personal

masks: Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence


texts:
 materials, such as her correspondence, a diary of the year she began to transition, photographs, and her autobiographical writing. Kinsey also contributed to "Transvestia". <mask> was critical of medical views on gender-affirmation surgery. After the high-profile transition of Christine Jorgensen, <mask> wrote: "If only some of these American medical men could... not continually imagine that their own penis was removed when Christine's was, maybe we could see some sound thoughtful, imaginative progress made in the field." Legacy
Susan Stryker has written that the work of <mask> and others in connecting the transgender community with institutions of power "would produce long-lasting organizations and provide the base of a social movement." According to academic Joanne Meyerowitz, <mask> wanted her contributions to science to be recognized. An archive in Vallejo, California, is named after her.According to its website, "the goal of the Louise Lawrence Transgender Archive (LLTA) is to increase the understanding of transgender people and encourage new scholarship by making transgender historical materials available to students, scholars and the public." Her archives are housed in the <mask> Lawrence Collection at the Kinsey Institute at the Indiana University Bloomington. In 2015, her archival material was exhibited at the exhibition "Bring Your Own Body" at Cooper Union" curated by Jeanne Vaccaro with Stamatina Gregory. Chris E. Vargas designed a collage for the exhibition called "Transvestites in the News," named after the title <mask> gave to her scrapbooks. References

1912 births
1976 deaths
Transgender and transsexual artists
Transgender and transsexual women
20th-century American women artists
American magazine founders
20th-century American painters
20th-century

masks:
Lawrence
Lawrence
Louise Lawrence
Lawrence
Louise
Lawrence


texts:
<mask> (born 3 September 1985) is a Surinamese-Dutch professional boxer and mixed martial artist and former kickboxer. He is the current WBC Latino Heavyweight Champion and WBO Latino Heavyweight Champion. In kickboxing, he is the former WFCA Cruiserweight champion, Glory 95kg Slam Champion and It's Showtime 95MAX World champion. Early life
<mask> was born in Suriname. In 1990 at the age of five, he moved to the Netherlands with his family. Growing up in the Bijlmermeer neighborhood of Amsterdam, he was often involved in street fighting and began training in kickboxing at the age of thirteen, under the guidance of Lucien Carbin. After getting his "ass whooped" in his first day of training, he was motivated to improve.He had his first match at fifteen and won by first-round knockout. Some of his early sparring partners included Alistair and Valentijn Overeem, and Gilbert Yvel. Kickboxing career
In 2003, his first year as a professional, Spong won 12 fights. In 2004, he fought Rafi Zouheir at the Battle of Zaandam, winning his first European Muay Thai Title (World Kickboxing Network). In 2004, Spong visited Japan to compete in Shootboxing, losing to Ryuji Goto via unanimous decision. His next fight, in April 2005, was against Belgian Mohammed Ouali for another European Title (WPKL). Spong won the fight by unanimous decision.In December 2005, at the A-1 Combat Cup in Duisburg, Spong won his first tournament Championship after winning three consecutive fights by knockout. In 2006, Spong had two significant victories, knockout wins over Muay Thai veteran Joerie Mes and, two weeks later, K-1 fighter Kaoklai Kaennorsing, from Thailand. In 2007, Spong won the SLAMM world title up to 79 kg by defeating the

masks:
Tyrone Clinton Spong
Tyrone Spong


texts: Thai Yodchai Wor Petchpun via first-round TKO. In the following match, he defeated the Belarusian Dmitry Shakuta. On January 26, 2008, Spong won the World Full Contact Association (WFCA) World Thaiboxing Cruiserweight Championship by defeating Aurelien Duarte. Following this, he won the KO World Series 2008 by defeating Nikos Sokolis via knockout in the first round, and defended his WFCA Muay Thai title by finishing Ondrej Hutnik with a left liver punch in the second round. On April 26, 2008, Spong faced Azem Maksutaj at the K-1 World Grand Prix 2008 in Amsterdam, winning by knockout in the second round.He then defeated Gary Turner via TKO in the first round. On November 29, 2008, he became the inaugural  It's Showtime 95MAX World champion after beating Zabit Samedov by unanimous decision. On March 28, 2009, Spong participated in the first K-1 Heavyweight (−100 kg) Title tournament, held in Yokohama, Japan. He was beaten in the semifinals by Gokhan Saki, who won by KO in the extra round. Spong met Nathan Corbett at Champions of Champions II on June 27, 2009, in what was widely considered a battle between the two best Muay Thai fighters in the world at their weight class, for the W.M.C. world title −93 kg. The fight was close, with Spong knocking Corbett down in the second round, and ended with a controversial decision.In the third round, Corbett knocked <mask> out with a right hook causing the referee to stop the fight. However, due to the referee's misleading hand signals, Corbett rushed back in and knock Spong down once more, not sure that the fight had been stopped. After considerable confusion, the fight was declared a no contest. After defeating the Worlds heavyweight champion, Kyotaro on


texts: December 5, 2009, <mask> fought Jerome Le Banner in April 2010. Similarly to the Corbett fight, <mask> broke his right hand in the first round and was knocked down. Despite coming back strongly, he lost by decision. At the end of the year, he qualified for the K-1 World Grand Prix 2010 Final, defeating veteran Ray Sefo in an elimination match, only to lose to eventual winner Alistair Overeem at the quarter final stage in what was a more competitive fight than most had predicted, as Overeem was much the bigger fighter.At the start of 2011, Spong had to vacate the It's Showtime 95MAX world title due to a number of issues, such as not having had a title defense in the allocated two years and his management stating that he had moved up in weight to fight as a heavyweight. Spong knocked out Igor Mihaljevic with a left knee in the first round at It's Showtime 2011 Lyon on May 14, 2011. He defeated Loren Javier Jorge by unanimous decision at It's Showtime Madrid 2011 on June 18, 2011. Spong faced Melvin Manhoef at It's Showtime 2012 in Leeuwarden on January 28, 2012,  and won by unanimous decision. He faced the legendary Dutchman Peter Aerts at an It's Showtime event in Brussels, Belgium on June 30, 2012, and won by knockout in the third round. Spong fought Remy Bonjasky at Glory 5: London in London, England on March 23, 2013. Spong won via one-punch KO with a right hook in the second round.Spong returned to 95 kg to fight in the Glory 9: New York - 2013 95kg Slam in New York City, New York, United States on June 22, 2013. He had a scare in the quarter-finals when he was dropped by Michael Duut soon after the bout started, although it was not counted by the referee. Just moments after returning to his

masks: Spong Spong


texts: feet, Spong landed a crushing right hand on Duut, knocking Duut out and ensuring Spong's passage to the semifinals against Filip Verlinden. The Verlinden match was a technical battle, with Spong outpointing the Belgian and taking a unanimous decision. A match with Danyo Ilunga awaited him in the final but it ended in a controversial and anticlimactic fashion. As the fight began, both fighters met in the center of the ring and Spong unloaded a flurry of punches. As Ilunga covered up and prepared to counter, referee Mufadel Elghazaoui jumped in and stopped the fight, giving Spong the TKO win at just sixteen seconds of the first round.Although, it was later revealed that there was a "no standing eight count" rule in effect at the event as per the New York State Athletic Commission's regulations, the stoppage was still deemed premature by much of the kickboxing community. In a long-awaited rematch, Spong fought Corbett again at Glory 11: Chicago - Heavyweight World Championship Tournament in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States on October 12, 2013. Spong dropped Corbett twice with left hooks and won by second-round TKO . Spong fought in the Glory 15: Istanbul - Light Heavyweight World Championship Tournament in Istanbul, Turkey on April 12, 2014, competing for the inaugural Glory Light Heavyweight Championship. After defeating Saulo Cavalari via unanimous decision in the semifinals, he then faced Gökhan Saki in a highly anticipated rematch in the final. Midway through the opening round, Spong threw a kick to Saki's left leg. Saki checked the kick, causing Spong's lower right leg to fracture immediately and end the fight via TKO.Spong underwent surgery to repair his broken leg and returned to


texts:
 training in October 2014. On 14 April 2016, he stated that he had retired from kickboxing and was looking forward to new challenges. Mixed martial arts career

World Series of Fighting
Spong made his highly anticipated MMA debut against Travis Bartlett at World Series of Fighting 1 on November 3, 2012, in Las Vegas, Nevada in the light heavyweight (205 lb) division. For his MMA debut he trained with the Blackzilians for over a year with such fighters as K-1 World Grand Prix winner and former Strikeforce heavyweight champion Alistair Overeem and former UFC light heavyweight champions Rashad Evans and Vitor Belfort. Spong knocked out Bartlett at 3:15 of the first round with a straight right. Spong faced Angel DeAnda at World Series of Fighting 4 on August 10, 2013, in the main event. Spong won via unanimous decision.Eagle Fighting Championship
<mask> was scheduled to face Bigfoot Silva on January 28, 2022 at EFC 44. However, Silva pulled out of the bout and was replaced by Sergei Kharitonov. Spong lost the fight by technical knockout in the second round. Boxing career

Spong decided to begin a career in professional boxing at age 29. His first boxing match was on March 6, 2015, beating Gabor Farkas by KO in the first round. Spong defeated Juan Carlos Salas by KO in Round 1 at Brave Warriors in Action PPV event on May 27, 2017, in Mexico. On October 7, 2017, Spong won the WBC Latino Heavyweight Championship.Spong vs. Silgado
On August 31, 2018, Spong defeated Santander Silago via KO in the first round. Spong vs. Perea
In his next fight, Spong defeated Ytalo Perea via split decision. The scorecards read 97–93, 96–94 and 94–96 in favor of Spong. Spong vs. Minda
His following bout came against Jeyson


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 Minda. Spong ended the bout early via a second-round KO. Spong was due to face Oleksandr Usyk on October 12, 2019, but the bout was called off after Spong tested positive for the banned substance clomifene. However, his third sample, which was tested by VADA, came back negative.Titles

Kickboxing
Glory
2014 Glory Light Heavyweight World Championship Tournament Runner-up
2013 Glory 95kg Slam Tournament Champion
It's Showtime
2008 1st It's Showtime World 95MAX champion (Defense: 0)
World Full Contact Association
2008 World Full Contact Association (W.F.C.A.) Thaiboxing World Cruiserweight champion (Defense: 1)
KO World Series
2008 KO World Series '08 Oceania winner
SLAMM!! Events
2007 1st SLAMM Events 79 kg class champion (Defense: 0)
A1 World League
2005 A1 World League winner
World Professional Kickboxing League
2005 W.P.K.L. European Middleweight champion (Defense: 0)
World Kickboxing Network
2004 World Kickboxing Network (W.K.N.) Thaiboxing European Middleweight champion (Defense: 0)
Muay Thai Bond Nederland
 M.T.B.N. Muay Thai Dutch Junior class −66 kg class champion (Defense: 0)

Awards
2013 Kickboxingplanet.com Kickboxer of the year
2013 Liver Kick.com Fighter of the Year

Boxing
2017 WBC Latino Heavyweight Champion
2018 WBO Latino Heavyweight Champion

Personal life
Spong has four children. He is an avid animal enthusiast, as is evidenced by the majority of his tattoos, though he has faced criminal charges for his mistreatment of his pet cougar.He is the owner of several pit bull terriers, which he bred himself. Spong has trained in the United States with Floyd Mayweather Sr. He has also been decorated with the Honorary Order of the Yellow Star the highest order of Suriname by President


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<mask> (born June 21, 1939) is a Puerto Rican politician, international law attorney, writer, and current president of the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP). A former three-time senator, <mask> is a perennial PIP candidate for Governor of Puerto Rico. He led the Navy–Culebra protests that succeeded in the United States Navy abandoning the use of the Puerto Rican island of Culebra for military exercises and was a leader for the Cause of Vieques. Biography
<mask> was born in Aibonito, Puerto Rico. He attended high school at Colegio San Ignacio (class of 1957). He received his bachelor's degree in business administration and economy from Georgetown University in 1961, his juris doctor and master's degree in law from Yale University (Yale Law School), and his doctoral degree in international rights from Oxford University. He also did some post-doctoral research in Sweden.His first wife was Swedish and his son <mask> Axel was born in Stockholm. He has been a tenured professor of law at the University of Puerto Rico School of Law since 1967. <mask> became president of the Independence Party PIP when he was thirty-one years old and has been president of it five times during fifty years. Under his leadership, the PIP adopted a democratic socialist program. Although he has had limited success at the voting booth regarding his candidacy for the post of Governor of Puerto Rico in 1976, 1980, 1988, 2000 and 2004 — losing every time to either the Popular Democratic Party (PPD) or the New Progressive Party (PNP) candidate — he, nevertheless, has enjoyed great electoral success regarding his candidacy to the Senate, receiving more votes than any other candidate in the Puerto Rican senatorial elections of 1972, 1984, 1992 and 1996. In 1972, the thirty-three-year-old <mask> was elected to his first term as an at-large senator. He was also re-elected to at-large senatorial seats at

masks:
Rubén Ángel Berríos Martínez
Berríos
Berríos
Rubén
Berríos
Berríos


texts:
 the Puerto Rican Legislative Assembly on three additional occasions: 1984, 1992, and 1996.Berríos founded the Permanent Conference of Political Parties of Latin America and the Caribbean (COPPPAL), is a member of the Executive Council of the Latin American Human Rights Association (ALDHU), and Honorary President of the Socialist International (SI). He has published the books The Independence of Puerto Rico: Cause and Struggle, Puerto Rico: Nationality and Plebiscite, and Towards Puerto Rican Socialism, and has collaborated with various publications enjoying wide international prestige such as Foreign Affairs. In 2015, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega named Berrios as his political advisor. Berríos is widely admired by many in Puerto Rico, including those who do not follow his political ideology. In 1984, for example, he received 84% of the general vote in his candidacy for senator. Political views
Berríos believes that there should be a change in the U.S. maritime laws that force Puerto Rico to import and export goods on U.S. ships. Such laws increase the price of products entering or leaving the island.He also believes that the U.S. Selective Service laws should not apply to Puerto Rico without the consent of the Puerto Rican legislature. Civil disobedience

In 1971, Berríos led the Navy-Culebra protests that criticized the United States Navy's use of the island of Culebra, Puerto Rico for military exercises. He squatted in Culebra's Flamenco Beach for three days. He was then arrested and imprisoned for three months. In part because of his efforts, the U.S. Navy abandoned its facilities in Culebra. On May 8, 1999, Berríos began camping inside the U.S. Navy bombing practice grounds in the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico (see Navy-Vieques protests).He stayed in the Gilberto Concepción de Gracia encampment — baptized in honor of the PIP founder — for 362 consecutive


texts:
 days, enduring both camp devastations due to storms and declining health due to a new diagnosis of prostate cancer. In December 1999, he resigned  his Senate seat due to the uncertainty and prolongation of his stay at the encampment. On May 4, 2000, the encampments were evacuated by federal marshals and United States Marines, and Berríos was arrested. Berríos' arrest was televised island-wide in Puerto Rico. Five days later, Berríos reentered the Vieques target practice grounds. As a result, he was arrested and went to trial at the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico, in San Juan, and sentenced to six hours of detention. Similar to what <mask> Martínez had done in Culebra thirty years before, Berríos did not recognize the jurisdiction of the American judicial forum in Puerto Rico during his trial for the Vieques trespassing, and did not present any legal defense.Speaking to <mask> Martínez, the sentencing judge said, "Odd as it may seem to you, we both are on the side of democracy on this one; you are complying with your conscience. I am also complying with mine." With the continuation of bombing practices by the U.S. Navy, <mask> announced his intention to enter the restricted grounds for a third time. He stayed for five days in the target practice area, before being arrested violently and forced to lie on a hot gravel road for an extended period of time after being handcuffed with his hands to his back with the other PIP members that accompanied him at the U.S. Navy bombing range. This time, convicted for the fourth time (one in Culebra and three additional civil disobedience arrests) by a United States District Court, <mask> was sentenced to four months in prison. The U.S. Navy abandoned its facilities in Vieques on May 1, 2003, by order of President George W. Bush. Former professions or positions held
 Currently a professor at the

masks: Berríos Berríos Berríos Berríos


texts:
 University of Puerto Rico, School of Law (2006)
 Candidate for Governor of Puerto Rico (1976, 1980, 1988, 2000, 2004) - has never won
 Civil disobedient for the Navy-Culebra protests (1971) and the Cause of Vieques (1999)
 Lawyer
 President of Puerto Rican Independence Party (1970 to present)
 Professor of Law at the University of Puerto Rico (1967–1971)
 Senator of Puerto Rico (1972–1976, 1984–1988, 1993–1996)

Writings, books, speeches
Berríos has authored the following works and speeches:
 The Independence of Puerto Rico: Cause and Struggle.Speech before the United Nations about colonialism in Puerto Rico, August 1973
 Towards Puerto Rican Socialism. Puerto Rico
 La Independencia de Puerto Rico: Razón y Lucha, 1984
 Puerto Rico's Decolonization. Foreign Affairs, Council on Foreign Affairs, 1997
 Un Mapa Para la Ruta (A Road Map), 2004. See also

List of Puerto Ricans
Latin American and Caribbean Congress in Solidarity with Puerto Rico's Independence
Manuel Rodríguez Orellana, Esq. - PIP Secretary of Relations with North America

References

 Puerto Rican Independence Party (1998). [<mask> Berríos: Cápsula Biográfica]. Puerto Rico.Puerto Rico Herald. Biography: <mask> Berríos. Puerto Rico. External links
 Portraits of Notable Individuals in the Struggle for Puerto Rican Independence
 PIP President Returns to Jail. 1939 births
Living people
People from Aibonito, Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico Independence Party politicians
McDonough School of Business alumni
Members of the Senate of Puerto Rico
Puerto Rican socialists
Leaders of political parties
Yale Law School alumni
Puerto Rican party leaders
Alumni of the University of Oxford
Stockholm University alumni
Puerto Rican prisoners and detainees
Prisoners and detainees of the United States federal government
Colegio San Ignacio de Loyola alumni
Puerto Rican independence activists
International law scholars
University of

masks: Rubén Rubén


texts:
<mask> (fl. 1239–58), also known as <mask>'<mask>, was an Anglo-Norman knight, Sheriff of Connacht, and ancestor of the Clan Siurtain Gaileng/Mac Siurtain/<mask> of Connacht. Life and family

<mask> took his family name from the town of Exeter in Devon, England but it is not known if he or previous members of the family were the first in Ireland. He appears to have participated in <mask>'s conquest of Connacht in 1230s. De Burgh granted the barony or cantred of Gallen to <mask>, who transferred it to <mask>, who was in possession of it by 1239. In 1250 Henry III gave him twenty-five marks yearly "in reward of services until he should be given waste lands worth £20 a year, which were given about the parish of Killallaghtan in Galway, to be held by the service of one knight." (p. 307)

He built the castle of Ballylahan – now on the junction of the N58 and R321 in County Mayo.It overlooked Athlethan, or Strade, where he built an abbey for the Franciscans but at the behest of his wife, transferred it to the Dominicans in 1253. His wife was Basilia <mask>rmingham, a daughter of Meyler <mask>, lord of Athenry. They had sons Meiler <mask> (d. 1289) and <mask> <mask> (fl.1269–1319). Exploits

Jordan is first recorded in the Annals of Connacht in 1247, when:

A great war was waged by <mask> son of Aed O Conbhobair and Donnchad son of Anmchad son of Donnchad O Gillapatraic of Ossory against the Galls of Connacht. <mask>lbach assembled the kings' sons of Connacht and they reached Fid O nDiarmata and Muinter Fathaig, where they killed some people, and passed on to Galway, where they burned the town and the castle and where

masks:
Jordan de Exeter
Jordan d
Exeter
Mac Jordan
De Exeter
Richard Mor de Burgh
Hugh de Lacy
Jordan de Exeter
de Be
de Bermingham
de Exeter
Jordan Óge
de Exeter
Toirrdelbach
Toirrde


texts:
 very many people were killed, Donnchad O Gillaptraic of Ossory killing Mac Elgeit, the Seneschal of Connacht. The Galls followed them up and engaged them, and they killed a [further] number of Galls and escaped in spite of them, coming afterwards to Carra. Jordan D'<mask> and the children of Adam [Standon] and the Galls of Carra (Carra, County Mayo) assembled and moved against <mask>, but he left the country to them, not being strong enough to oppose them.In the following year, 1248, the same annals state that:

The sons of Magnus, and the son of Conchobar Ruad made a hosting and revolted against the Galls. They burned Mac Henry's castle and captured its warden and carried the preys of North Umall onto the islands of Clew Bay. Then <mask>'<mask> and John Butler and Robin Laigles and many others assembled and marched first to Ballintober and thence to Aghagower, and next day they plundered Umall, north and south. Then [Mac] Henry came into Umall with a great army, for Umall belonged to him and he lived there. However, he made peace with Domnall son of Magnus, who promised to supply him with men and ships to attack his [i.e. Domnall's own] kinsmen. Now they were on the Clew Bay islands, and it was told them that a body of men were on their way from Mac Henry to Domnall, to fetch boats.They went out against this company and Ouain mac na Gaillsighe and Seon mac in Gaillshacairt were killed, and in that conflict Diarmait son of Magnus killed Senoitt Guer and four of his followers. For this was a victory with defeat, since that valorous champion and well-tried warrior, Diarmait son of Magnus, was himself killed.

masks:
Exeter
Toirrdebach
Jordan D
Exeter


texts:
Sheriff of Connacht
His most famous exploit was leading the cavalry charge that won the First Battle of Athenry in 1249. The Annals of Connacht relate that:

The kings' sons of Connacht made another hosting, to burn and pillage Athenry, at the feast of Mary in mid-autumn. They went thither, a great host, including <mask> son of Aed and Aed son of Aed, and the Sheriff of Connacht was there to meet them, with many Galls. The Galls asked for a truce on that day, on account of its sanctity; in honour of Mary Mother whose day it was. The princes would not grant that truce to honour Mary or the Crucifixion, but attacked the town, though <mask>lbach was unwilling.When <mask> [D'Exeter] and the Galls saw this they issued from the town against the princes. Mary wrought a miracle then; for when the princes and their followers saw the horsemen in arms and armour making towards them, horror and dread seized them and they were put to flight. Aed son of Aed O Conchobair was killed there, and Diarmait Ruad son of Cormac O Mailsechlainn, O Cellaig's two sons, Brian of the Wood son of Magnus, Carrach Insiubail son of Niall O Conchobair, Baethgalach Mac Aedacain, Mathgamain son of Tadc son of Diarmait Bachlach O Conchobair, Lochlainn O Conchobair's two sons, Domnall son of Cormac Mac Diarmata, Findanach Mac Branain, Cu Muman Mac Casurlaig and many others. "

<mask> himself was killed in 1258 while fending off a raid by Dubhghall mac Ruaidhrí:

A great fleet came from the Hebrides with Mac Somurli. They sailed round the west of Ireland into Connemara and robbed a merchant ship of all her goods; wine,

masks: Toirrdebach Toirrde Jordan Jordan


texts:
 copper, cloth and iron. The Sheriff of Connacht, <mask>'<mask>, put out with a fleet full of Galls in pursuit of Mac Somurli and the fleet which had committed that piracy. Mac Somurli had landed on an island and drawn his ships up onto the land, and when they saw the Sheriff's fleet approaching he and his men put on their armour and fighting accoutrement.When the Sheriff reached the island he and his men, with those of the Galls who were ready with him, went quickly ashore. But he was met and dealt with by Mac Somurli and his men, being killed at once, together with Piers Accabard, an excellent knight of his company, and other good men. The fleet of the Galls retired after losing the best of their lords, and Mac Somurli went back to his land, joyful and laden with spoil. Family and descendants

<mask> was the founder of the <mask>, or Mac Síurtáin, family. The family held lands in the barony of Gallen in what is now County Mayo, later known as Tir Mac Síurtáin or Mac Síurtáin's Country. They became progressively Gaelicized over the succeeding generations, especially after the failure of the Norman colonies in Connacht. Their family name was anglicised to MacJordan and, in later times shortened to simply Jordan.References

Knox, Robert Thomas. The History of the County of Mayo to the Close of the Sixteenth Century. With illustrations and three maps.'' (Originally published c.1890. Castlebourke, De Burca 2000. External links
http://www.ucc.ie/celt/published/G100011/index.html

13th-century births
13th-century Irish people
1258 deaths
Normans in Ireland
Norman warriors
People from County Galway
People from County

masks:
Jordan d
Exeter
De Exeter
Mac Jordan


texts:
<mask>. ( ; born January 10, 1940) is an American linguist, author, management consultant, trainer and speaker. Grinder is credited with co-creating neuro-linguistic programming, with Richard Bandler. He is co-director of Quantum Leap Inc., a management consulting firm founded by his partner Carmen Bostic St. Clair in 1987 (Grinder joined in 1989). Grinder and Bostic St. Clair also run workshops and seminars on NLP internationally. Life and career
Grinder graduated from the University of San Francisco with a B.A. degree in psychology in the early 1960s. Grinder then entered the United States Army and served as a captain in the US Special Forces in Europe during the Cold War; following this he went on to work for a US intelligence agency.In the late 1960s, he returned to college to study linguistics and received his Ph.D. degree from the University of California, San Diego in 1971. His dissertation, titled On Deletion Phenomena in English, was published by Mouton in 1976. In the early 1970s, Grinder worked in George A. Miller's laboratory at Rockefeller University. After receiving his doctorate, Grinder took a full-time position as an assistant professor in the linguistics faculty at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC). He engaged in undergraduate teaching, graduate teaching, and research. His research focused on Noam Chomsky's theories of transformational grammar specializing in syntax and deletion phenomena. He published several research papers with Paul Postal on the syntactical structures relating to "missing antecedents" or missing parasitic gaps for the pronoun.They argued that the syntactic structure of a deleted verb phrase (VP) is complete. Edward Klima, doctoral adviser to both Postal and Grinder at UCSC, became involved in the early development of generative semantics. <mask> co-authored, with Suzette Elgin, a linguistics text book titled A Guide to Transformational Grammar: History, Theory, Practice. In 2005, Grinder

masks:
John Thomas Grinder Jr
Grinder


texts:
 published Steps to an Ecology of Emergence with Tom Malloy and Carmen Bostic St Clair in the journal Cybernetics and Human Knowing. Development of neuro-linguistic programming

In 1972 (during Grinder's stint at UCSC) Richard Bandler, an undergraduate student of psychology, approached him for assistance in specific aspects of modeling Gestalt therapy. Bandler, along with good friend Frank Pucelik, had spent much time recording and editing recordings of Fritz Perls (founder of Gestalt therapy) and had learned Gestalt therapy implicitly during intense group sessions. After some time, Grinder was invited to participate in group discussions.Although at first Grinder sat quietly, he eventually approached Bandler and Pucelik with some observations and questions. Grinder left a lasting impression on Pucelik and was later dubbed 'the real genius'. Bandler and Pucelik invited <mask> to team up, eventually creating a very close group. Although Bandler, Grinder and Pucelik were the main driving force, there were several other students at the university who contributed ‘a hell of a lot’ according to Pucelik. In the end, hours of unpaid research significantly aided the formation of Meta - modern day NLP. From there Grinder and Bandler modelled the various cognitive behavioral patterns of therapists such as Perls, a leading figure in family therapy Virginia Satir and later the leading figure in hypnosis in psychiatry Milton Erickson. As a result, The Structure of Magic Volumes I & II (1975, 1976), Patterns of the Hypnotic Techniques of Milton H. Erickson, Volumes I & II (1975, 1977) and Changing With Families (1976) were published.This work formed the basis of the methodology that became the foundation of neuro-linguistic programming. The trio began hosting seminars and practice groups. These served as a place to practice and test their newly discovered patterns while allowing them to transfer the skills to the participants. Several books were published based


texts:
 on transcripts of their seminars, including Frogs into Princes (1979). During this period, a creative group of students and psychotherapists were asked to join including Robert Dilts, Leslie Cameron-Bandler, Judith DeLozier, Stephen Gilligan and David Gordon (All of whom are considered the second generation of co-developers; recruited by Bandler, <mask> and Pucelik after the original team graduated from university). In the 1977, Bandler requested that Pucelik be removed from the group for personal reasons - which was agreed to by immediate mutual consent. It wasn't long after that that Bandler, <mask> and their group of associates split acrimoniously, and stopped working together.Following this, many members of their group went out on their own and took NLP in their own directions. Some of Bandler and Grinder's books went out of print for a while due to legal problems between the co-authors. Structure I & II, and Patterns I & II – considered the foundation of the field – were later republished. Bandler attempted to claim legal ownership of the term neuro-linguistic programming; however, it was eventually deemed to be a generic term, and could therefore not be trademarked. Grinder and Bandler settled their claims around 2001, clearing a platform for the future development of NLP as a legitimate field of endeavor. New code of neuro-linguistic programming

Between 1982 and 1987, strongly influenced by anthropologist and systems theorist Gregory Bateson, who had a strong focus on ecology as a psychological construct, <mask> and Judith DeLozier collaborated to develop the "New Code of NLP". (<mask> and Bateson had met during their affiliation with Kresge College at the University of California, Santa Cruz during the 1970s.)Grinder and Delozier presented an aesthetic framework for the "classic code" of NLP that explicates the involvement of ecology and the unconscious mind in change-work. "Ecology" in NLP involves respecting the integrity of a system as

masks: Grinder Grinder Grinder Grinder


texts:
 a whole when assessing a change to that system; the "system" in this case comprises a person's model of the world and the consequences of that model in the person's environment. Practically speaking, this consideration entails asking questions like "What are the intended effects of this change? What other effects might this change have, and are those effects desirable? Is this change still a good idea?" The seminars were transcribed and published in 1987 as Turtles All the Way Down; Prerequisites to Personal Genius. <mask> and Carmen Bostic St Clair have further developed The New Code of NLP.(Bostic St Clair founded Quantum Leap Inc., a cultural-change consultancy firm.) Grinder and Bostic St Clair continue to present public seminars on NLP internationally. In 2001, Grinder (with Bostic St Clair) published Whispering in the Wind with a "set of recommendations as to how specifically NLP can improve its practice and take its rightful place as a scientifically based endeavor with its precise focus on modeling of the extremes of human behavior: excellence and the high performers who actually do it". Grinder has since begun to strongly encourage the field to make a recommitment to what he considers the core activity of NLP: modeling. Bibliography

Linguistics

Reviews and discussion by others

Neuro-linguistic programming

New code of neuro-linguistic programming

See also
Transformational grammar
Neuro-linguistic programming
Modeling (NLP)
Richard Bandler

Notes and references

External links
Official Website of <mask>; co-creator of NLP
UK homepage for <mask>der
2002 Interview with <mask> and Carmen Bostic St Clair
Grinder's Biography on Robert Dilts web site

1940 births
Living people
Linguists from the United States
American psychology writers
American male non-fiction writers
American self-help writers
American social sciences writers
Neuro-linguistic programming writers
Syntacticians
University of California, Santa Cruz alumni
United States Army

masks:
John Grinder
John Grinder
John Grin
John Grinder


texts:
<mask> (born 1964) is a British contemporary artist, working with collage art, music and video. His found object art and video pieces, which incorporate themes of nostalgia and anxiety, and draw on elements of pop culture, span several videos. In particular, he is known for Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999) and Industrial Light and Magic (2008), for which he won the 2008 Turner Prize. His work has been widely exhibited internationally, including solo exhibitions at Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne, in 2008 and at Le Consortium, Dijon, in 2007. His performances have been presented in New York City at the Museum of Modern Art, Abrons Arts Center; at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, both in 2009; and at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City, in 2008. His works are held in the collections of the Tate and the Centre Pompidou. Life and career

<mask> was born in Birkenhead, Wirral, near Liverpool, in 1964.In a 2008 interview in The Guardian, he described how he grew up in a working class family and became a ‘casual’ in his youth. His parents both worked for Littlewoods, the clothes store and betting company based in Liverpool. School, at a comprehensive in Ellesmere Port in Cheshire, was not a happy experience for Leckey. He left school at 15 with one O Level, in art, and at 19 became obsessed with learning about ancient civilizations. He has described himself as an autodidact, "That's why I use bigger words than I should. It's a classic sign." Following a conversation with his stepfather he took his A Levels and went to an art college in Newcastle from 1987 to 1990, but didn't enjoy it.<mask> moved to New York in late 1995 and first returned to London in 1997, where he worked for web design agency Online Magic. When he made the video Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore in 1999, he was living in a tiny flat in Windmill Street, in Fitzrovia. He formed the band donAteller with Ed Laliq, and had the first gig at the 414 Club in Brixton.

masks:
Mark Leckey
Leckey
Leckey


texts:
 Later band members include Enrico David and Bonnie Camplin. He served as professor of film studies at the Städelschule, Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany from 2005 to 2009. He lives in north London with his wife, Lizzie Carey-Thomas, a curator of contemporary art at the Serpentine Gallery, and their daughter. Art career
<mask>'s video work has as its subject the "tawdry but somehow romantic elegance of certain aspects of British culture," He likes the idea of letting "culture use you as an instrument."but adds that the pretentiousness that artists sometimes fall into is destructive to the artistic process: "What gets in the way is being too clever, or worrying about how something is going to function, or where it's going to be. When you start thinking of something as art, you're fucked: you're never going to advance." Matthew Higgs has described his work as “possess[ing] a strange nonartlike quality, operating, as it does, on the knife's edge where art and life meet." Leckey cited Erik Davis, the Californian cultural critic as a big influence. He classified himself as a pop artist. He exhibited alongside Damien Hirst in the 1990 New Contemporaries exhibition at the ICA but afterwards dropped from view, before making a "comeback" with Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore in 1999. In 2004, he participated in Manifesta 5, The European Biennial of Contemporary Art.In 2006 he participated in the Tate Triennial. In 2013, <mask> toured the UK for his curatorial project, The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things, commissioned by the Hayward Gallery. In the autumn of 2014, the Wiels contemporary art centre in Brussels staged a mid-career retrospective devoted to Leckey. The exhibition, named Lending Enchantment to Vulgar Materials, is <mask>’s largest exhibition to date. The title comes from a letter by Guillaume Apollinaire, in which he claims that what he and filmmaker Georges Méliès do is "lend enchantment to vulgar materials". In 2019 Lecky exhibited O'

masks: Leckey Leckey Leckey


texts:
 Magic Power of Bleakness at Tate Britain, London. Notable works

Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999)

One evening in 1999, Gavin Brown, Martin McGeown and Leckey were at a gallery private view in London.Emma Dexter, then a curator at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), talked to <mask>, who argued that the most exciting art form of the time was music video. Intrigued, Dexter invited him to make a work. <mask> produced a 15-minute film that he called Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore. The work was first screened at the ICA. The work is a compilation of found footage from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s underground music and dance scene in the UK. It starts with the disco scene of the 1970s, touches upon the Northern soul of the late 1970s and early 1980s and climaxes with the rave scene of the 1990s. Mash-ups of a single soundtrack play during the whole video, giving a sense of unity and narrative to the video.However, there are moments of spoken text. At one point an animated element - a bird tattoo image - appears as if released from the hand of a dancer, then carried into the next shot finds its place on the arm of another of the film's nightclubbing subjects. Some dance moves are played on loop for a few seconds, some are played in slow motion. A significant portion of the footage is taken from the 1977 Tony Palmer film The Wigan Casino made for Granada TV. It follows on the path of several previous appropriative art video artists and critics have remarked on its similarities with William S. Burroughs' technique of cut-ups, a literary technique whereupon a text’s sentences or words are cut up and later randomly re-hashed into a new text. Writing about <mask>’s first few video pieces, which in addition to Fiorucci… include We Are (Untitled) (2000) and Parade (2003), the art critic Catherine Wood said that they "represent the human subject striving to spread itself out into a reduced dimensionality. His subjects dance, take drugs and dress up in


texts:
 their attempts to transcend the obstinate physicality of the body and disappear in abstract identification with the ecstasy of music, or the seamlessness of the image."The title, Leckey said, was about the notion that "something as trite and throwaway and exploitative as a jeans manufacturer can be taken by a group of people and made into something totemic, and powerful, and life-affirming." <mask> admitted that he cried during the making of the video. Sound System (2002)
Leckey has made ‘immersion’ pieces that offer aural and visual stimuli to the audience, such as Sound System (2002). Made in 'Eaven (2004)
This video takes place in <mask>’s empty London studio. The camera rotates around Jeff Koons’ Rabbit (1986), which is placed in the center of the empty room, Leckey's London flat. The video was transferred to 16 mm film and "is presented on a pedestal, like a sculpture." The shiny surface of the sculpture reflects the room clearly, but there is no reflection of the camera, after a while the viewer realizes that there was never a bunny in the studio; it was a computer-generated image of Koons' work.<mask> is an admirer of Koons and has talked about what it is that attracts him to his work: "I like the idea of something that's almost inhuman in its perfection, like Bunny. It's as if it just appeared in the world, as if Koons just imagined it and it appeared. I always get too involved in the work." Drunken Bakers (2006)
In this video <mask> appropriates the Drunken Bakers comic strip from Viz, written by Barney Farmer and illustrated by Lee Healey. <mask> filmed the comic strip, added close-ups and jump-cuts reworked into a stop-motion like video. <mask> has removed all the speech bubbles and replaced them with a dialogue read verbatim from the comic by himself and Steven Claydon, a member of his band JackTooJack. He also added aural effects with burping, vomiting, slurping, among others and fades to black between episodes.The piece is

masks: Leckey Leckey Leckey Leckey Leckey Leckey


texts:
 projected on a white wall in a completely white room, a clock projected in the outside of the room moves between from three to four, before returning to three and repeating the cycle. The comic and video itself lack color, so the only two colors in the room are black and white. As with some of his previous work, it deals "with hedonistic time-wasting as a means of (temporary) escape from the strictures of capitalism and adult responsibility." Roberta Smith noted "Mr. Leckey conveys an oppressive sense of the drinker's irresistible drive for oblivion, excavating the painful realities that often spur comedy." In this act of appropriation, <mask> did not get official permission to use the material from Viz, "which, in a rare instance of corporate enlightenment, granted him permission retroactively." Felix Gets Broadcast (2007)
In Felix Gets Broadcast (2007), <mask> features one of the earlier figures of Felix The Cat. Industrial Light and Magic (2008)
He won the 2008 Turner Prize for his exhibition Industrial Light and Magic.It included the piece Cinema-in-the-Round a video lecture where "the artist offers a compilation of his talks on film, television and video about the relationship between object and image." GreenScreenRefrigeratorAction (2010)
This performance work began with his inhaling the gases used as coolant for a Samsung fridge. <mask> voices, through digital modulation, the inner monologue of a black Samsung fridge-freezer, as it tries to explain itself to itself and the world around it. The work, Leckey said, is a kind of fantasy: that he could bring himself into "a state outside of myself, fridge-like, less-human, feeling like an image". BigBoxStatueAction (2003–2011)
For BigBoxStatueAction, <mask> places one of his sound systems 'in conversation' with icons of British modernist sculptures, such as Jacob Epstein's Jacob and the Angel and Henry Moore's sculpture. In order to elicit a response from the sculpture, he serenades it

masks: Leckey Leckey Leckey Leckey


texts:
 with a sound piece created from sampled music and archive material. The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things / UniAddDumThs (2013-2015)
The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things was a curated exhibition held at Nottingham Contemporary.It took its title from a supposed concept in computing that refers to 'the possibility of a network of objects communicating with each other like sentient agents', and featured three galleries presenting different collections of artifacts and art pieces from a wide range of history. <mask> imagined it as a work of fiction, in his own words a 'non-realist, anti-realist, magic-realist, speculative, slipstream fiction, a sort of sci-fi show'. He also sought to evoke techno-animism. In 2015, <mask> exhibited UniAddDumThs, a 'replication' of The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things, at Kunsthalle Basel. It featured entirely reproduced versions of the objects in the original exhibition via 3D printing and cardboard cutouts. Dream English Kid, 1964 - 1999 AD (2015)
<mask> created Dream English Kid, 1964 - 1999 AD, a collage film with a coming-of-age theme created as an attempt to capture 'found memories' of his life from the early 1960s to the late 1990s, which gradually builds up in anxiety and suspension. Harry Thorne, writing for Frieze, commented that elements of the film, such as recurring references to solar and lunar eclipses (which <mask> has attributed to himself astrologically being a Cancerian or a 'moonchild'), and countdowns, 'communicate a desire to comprehend the greater universe that is specific to both a particular era and to the artist himself.'Collections
<mask>'s work is held in the following permanent collections:
Tate, London
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris

References

External links

Leckey's YouTube channel
<mask>'s selected works, Gavin Brown

1964 births
Living people
People from Birkenhead
People from Ellesmere Port
British video artists
Turner Prize winners
English contemporary

masks:
Leckey
Leckey
Leckey
Leckey
Leckey
Mark Leckey


texts: <mask> (25 December 1924 – 16 August 2018) was an Indian politician who served three terms as the prime minister of India, first for a term of 13 days in 1996, then for a period of 13 months from 1998 to 1999, followed by a full term from 1999 to 2004. <mask> was one of the co-founders and a senior leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He was a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a Hindu nationalist volunteer organisation. He was the first Indian prime minister not of the Indian National Congress to serve a full term in office. He was also a renowned poet and a writer. He was a member of the Indian Parliament for over five decades, having been elected ten times to the Lok Sabha, the lower house, and twice to the Rajya Sabha, the upper house. He served as the Member of Parliament for Lucknow, retiring from active politics in 2009 due to health concerns.He was among the founding members of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS), of which he was president from 1968 to 1972. The BJS merged with several other parties to form the Janata Party, which won the 1977 general election. In March 1977, <mask> became the minister of external affairs in the cabinet of Prime Minister Morarji Desai. He resigned in 1979, and the Janata alliance collapsed soon after. Former members of the BJS formed the BJP in 1980, with Vajpayee its first president. During his tenure as prime minister, India carried out the Pokhran-II nuclear tests in 1998. Vajpayee sought to improve diplomatic relations with Pakistan, travelling to Lahore by bus to meet with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.After the 1999 Kargil War with Pakistan, he sought to restore relations through engagement with President Pervez Musharraf, inviting him to India

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Atal Bihari Vajpayee
Vajpayee
Vajpayee


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 for a summit at Agra. The administration of Narendra Modi declared in 2014 that Vajpayee's birthday, 25 December, would be marked as Good Governance Day. In 2015, he was conferred India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, by the president of India, Pranab Mukherjee. He died on 16 August 2018 of age-related illness. Early life and education
Vajpayee was born into a Hindu Brahmin family on 25 December 1924 in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh. His mother and father were Krishna Devi and <mask> <mask>. His father was a school teacher in their home town.His grandfather, Shyam <mask>, had migrated to Morena near Gwalior from his ancestral village of Bateshwar in the Agra district of Uttar Pradesh. Vajpayee did his schooling at the Saraswati Shishu Mandir in Gwalior. In 1934, he was admitted to the Anglo-Vernacular Middle (AVM) School in Barnagar, Ujjain district, after his father joined as headmaster. He subsequently attended Gwalior's Victoria College (now Maharani Laxmi Bai Govt. College of Excellence) to study for a BA in Hindi, English and Sanskrit. He completed his post-graduation with an MA in Political Science from DAV College, Kanpur. Independence Movement

His activism started in Gwalior with Arya Kumar Sabha, the youth wing of the Arya Samaj movement, of which he became the general secretary in 1944.He also joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in 1939 as a swayamsevak, or volunteer. Influenced by Babasaheb Apte, he attended the Officers Training Camp of the RSS during 1940 to 1944, becoming a pracharak (RSS terminology for a full-time worker) in 1947. He gave up studying law due to the partition riots. He was sent to Uttar Pradesh as a vistarak (a probationary pracharak) and soon began

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Krishna Bihari
Vajpayee
Lal Vajpayee


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 working for the newspapers of Deendayal Upadhyaya: Rashtradharma (a Hindi monthly), Panchjanya (a Hindi weekly), and the dailies Swadesh and Veer Arjun. By 1942, at the age of 16 years, Vajpayee became an active member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Although the RSS had chosen not to participate in the Quit India Movement, in August 1942, Vajpayee and his elder brother Prem were arrested for 24 days during the Quit India Movement. He was released after giving a written statement that while he was a part of the crowd, he did not participate in the militant events in Bateshwar on 27 August 1942.Throughout his life, including after he became prime minister, Vajpayee has labelled the allegation a false rumour. Early political career (1947–1975)

In 1951, <mask> was seconded by the RSS, along with Deendayal Upadhyaya, to work for the newly formed Bharatiya Jana Sangh, a Hindu right-wing political party associated with the RSS. He was appointed as a national secretary of the party in charge of the Northern region, based in Delhi. He soon became a follower and aide of party leader Syama Prasad Mukherjee. In the 1957 Indian general election, Vajpayee contested elections to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament. He lost to Raja Mahendra Pratap in Mathura, but was elected from Balrampur. In the Lok Sabha his oratorial skills so impressed Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru that he predicted that Vajpayee would someday become the prime minister of India.Vajpayee's oratorial skills won him the reputation of being the most eloquent defender of the Jana Sangh's policies. After the death of Deendayal Upadhyaya, the leadership of the Jana Sangh passed to Vajpayee. He became the national


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 president of the Jana Sangh in 1968, running the party along with Nanaji Deshmukh, Balraj Madhok, and L. K. Advani. Janata and the BJP (1975–1995)

Vajpayee was arrested along with several other opposition leaders during the Internal Emergency imposed by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1975. Initially interned in Bangalore, Vajpayee appealed his imprisonment on the grounds of bad health, and was moved to a hospital in Delhi. In December 1976, Vajpayee ordered the student activists of the ABVP to tender an unconditional apology to Indira Gandhi for perpetrating violence and disorder. The ABVP student leaders refused to obey his order.Gandhi ended the state of emergency in 1977. A coalition of parties, including the BJS, came together to form the Janata Party, which won the 1977 general elections. Morarji Desai, the chosen leader of the alliance, became the prime minister. <mask> served as the minister of external affairs, or foreign minister, in Desai's cabinet. As foreign minister, <mask> became the first person in 1977 to deliver a speech to the United Nations General Assembly in Hindi. In 1979, Desai and Vajpayee resigned, triggering the collapse of the Janata Party. The erstwhile members of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh came together to form the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 1980, with <mask> as its first President.The 1984 general elections were held in the wake of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination by her Sikh bodyguards. While he had won the 1977 and the 1980 elections from New Delhi, <mask> shifted to his home town Gwalior for the election. Vidya Razdan was initially tipped to be the Congress (I) candidate. Instead, Madhavrao Scindia, scion of the Gwalior royal family, was brought in

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texts: on the last day of filing nominations. <mask> lost to Scindia, managing to secure only 29% of the votes. Under <mask>, the BJP moderated the Hindu-nationalist position of the Jana Sangh, emphasising its connection to the Janata Party and expressing support for Gandhian Socialism. The ideological shift did not bring it success: Indira Gandhi's assassination generated sympathy for the Congress, leading to a massive victory at the polls.The BJP won only two seats in parliament. <mask> offered to quit as party president following BJP's dismal performance in the election, but stayed in the post until 1986. He was elected to the Rajya Sabha in 1986 from Madhya Pradesh, and was briefly the leader of the BJP in Parliament. In 1986, L. K. Advani took office as president of the BJP. Under him, the BJP returned to a policy of hardline Hindu nationalism. It became the political voice of the Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir Movement, which sought to build a temple dedicated to the Hindu deity Rama in Ayodhya. The temple would be built at a site believed to be the birthplace of Rama after demolishing a 16th-century mosque, called the Babri Masjid, which then stood there.The strategy paid off for the BJP; it won 86 seats in the Lok Sabha in the 1989 general election, making its support crucial to the government of V. P. Singh. In December 1992, a group of religious volunteers led by members of the BJP, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), tore down the mosque. He served as Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha, for various terms starting at Balrampur from 19571962. He served again from Balrampur from 19671971, then from Gwalior from 19711977, and then from New Delhi from 19771984. Finally,

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 he served from Lucknow from 19912009. Terms as prime minister (1996–2004)

First term: May 1996

During a BJP conference in Mumbai in November 1995, BJP President Advani declared that Vajpayee would be the party's prime ministerial candidate in the forthcoming elections. <mask> himself was reported to be unhappy with the announcement, responding by saying that the party needed to win the election first.The BJP became the single largest party in Parliament in the 1996 general election, helped by religious polarisation across the country as a result of the demolition of the Babri Masjid. Indian president Shankar Dayal Sharma invited Vajpayee to form the government. <mask> was sworn in as the 10th prime minister of India, but the BJP failed to muster a majority among members of the Lok Sabha. <mask> resigned after 16 days, when it became clear that he did not have enough support to form a government. Second term: 1998–1999

After the fall of the two United Front governments between 1996 and 1998, the Lok Sabha was dissolved and fresh elections were held. The 1998 general elections again put the BJP ahead of others. A number of political parties joined the BJP to form the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), and <mask> was sworn in as the prime minister.The coalition was an uneasy one, as apart from the Shiv Sena, none of the other parties espoused the BJP's Hindu-nationalist ideology. Vajpayee has been credited for managing this coalition successfully, while facing ideological pressure from the hardline wing of the party and from the RSS. <mask>'s government lasted 13 months until mid-1999 when the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) under J. Jayalalithaa withdrew its support. The

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 government lost the ensuing vote of confidence motion in the Lok Sabha by a single vote on 17 April 1999. As the opposition was unable to come up with the numbers to form the new government, the Lok Sabha was again dissolved and fresh elections were held. Nuclear tests

In May 1998, India conducted five underground nuclear tests in the Pokhran desert in Rajasthan, 24 years after its first nuclear test (Smiling Buddha) in 1974. Two weeks later, Pakistan responded with its own nuclear tests making it the newest nation with declared nuclear capability.While some nations, such as France, endorsed India's right to defensive nuclear power, others including the United States, Canada, Japan, Britain and the European Union imposed sanctions on information, resources and technology to India. In spite of intense international criticism and steady decline in foreign investment and trade, the nuclear tests were popular domestically. In effect, the international sanctions imposed failed to sway India from weaponising its nuclear capability. US sanctions against India and Pakistan were eventually lifted after just six months. Lahore summit
In late 1998 and early 1999, Vajpayee began a push for a full-scale diplomatic peace process with Pakistan. With the historic inauguration of the Delhi-Lahore bus service in February 1999, Vajpayee initiated a new peace process aimed towards permanently resolving the Kashmir dispute and other conflicts with Pakistan. The resultant Lahore Declaration espoused a commitment to dialogue, expanded trade relations and mutual friendship and envisaged a goal of denuclearised South Asia.This eased the tension created by the 1998 nuclear tests, not only within the two nations but also


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 in South Asia and the rest of the world. AIADMK's withdrawal from coalition
The AIADMK had continually threatened to withdraw from the coalition and national leaders repeatedly flew down from Delhi to Chennai to pacify the AIADMK general secretary J. Jayalalithaa. However, in May 1999, the AIADMK did pull the plug on the NDA, and the Vajpayee administration was reduced to a caretaker status pending fresh elections scheduled for October 1999. Kargil War

In May 1999 some Kashmiri shepherds discovered the presence of militants and non-uniformed Pakistani soldiers (many with official identifications and Pakistan Army's custom weaponry) in the Kashmir Valley, where they had taken control of border hilltops and unmanned border posts. The incursion was centred around the town of Kargil, but also included the Batalik and Akhnoor sectors and artillery exchanges at the Siachen Glacier. The Indian army responded with Operation Vijay, which launched on 26 May 1999. This saw the Indian military fighting thousands of militants and soldiers in the midst of heavy artillery shelling and while facing extremely cold weather, snow and treacherous terrain at the high altitude.Over 500 Indian soldiers were killed in the three-month-long Kargil War, and it is estimated around 600–4,000 Pakistani militants and soldiers died as well. India pushed back the Pakistani militants and Northern Light Infantry soldiers. Almost 70% of the territory was recaptured by India. Vajpayee sent a "secret letter" to U.S. President Bill Clinton that if Pakistani infiltrators did not withdraw from the Indian territory, "we will get them out, one way or the other" - meaning he did not rule out crossing the Line of Control (LoC), or was the


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 use of nuclear weapons. After Pakistan suffered heavy losses, and with both the United States and China refusing to condone the incursion or threaten India to stop its military operations, General Pervez Musharraf was recalcitrant and Nawaz Sharif asked the remaining militants to stop and withdraw to positions along the LoC. The militants were not willing to accept orders from Sharif but the NLI soldiers withdrew. The militants were killed by the Indian army or forced to withdraw in skirmishes which continued even after the announcement of withdrawal by Pakistan.Third term: 1999–2004

1999–2002
The 1999 general elections were held in the aftermath of the Kargil operations. The BJP-led NDA won 303 seats out of the 543 seats in the Lok Sabha, securing a comfortable and stable majority. On 13 October 1999, Vajpayee took oath as the prime minister of India for the third time. A national crisis emerged in December 1999, when Indian Airlines flight IC 814 from Kathmandu to New Delhi was hijacked by five terrorists and flown to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. The hijackers made several demands including the release of certain terrorists like Masood Azhar from prison. Under pressure, the government ultimately caved in. Jaswant Singh, the minister of external affairs at the time, flew with the terrorists to Afghanistan and exchanged them for the passengers.In March 2000, Bill Clinton, the President of the United States, paid a state visit to India. This was the first state visit to India by a U.S. president in 22 years, since President Jimmy Carter's visit in 1978. President Clinton's visit was hailed as a significant milestone in relations between the two nations. Vajpayee and Clinton had wide-ranging


texts: discussions on bilateral, regional and international developments. The visit led to expansion in trade and economic ties between India and the United States. A vision document on the future course of Indo-U.S. relations was signed during the visit. Domestically, the BJP-led government was influenced by the RSS, but owing to its dependence on coalition support, it was impossible for the BJP to push items like building the Ram Janmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya, repealing Article 370 which gave a special status to the state of Kashmir, or enacting a uniform civil code applicable to adherents of all religions.On 17 January 2000, there were reports of the RSS and some BJP hard-liners threatening to restart the Jan Sangh, the precursor to the BJP, because of their discontent over Vajpayee's rule. Former president of the Jan Sangh Balraj Madhok had written a letter to the then-RSS chief Rajendra Singh for support. The BJP was, however, accused of "saffronising" the official state education curriculum and apparatus, saffron being the colour of the RSS flag of the RSS, and a symbol of the Hindu nationalism movement. Home Minister L. K. Advani and the Human Resource Development Minister (now called Education Minister) Murli Manohar Joshi were indicted in the 1992 Babri Mosque demolition case for inciting a mob of activists. Vajpayee himself came under public scrutiny owing to his controversial speech one day prior to the mosque demolition. These years were accompanied by infighting in the administration and confusion regarding the direction of government. Vajpayee's weakening health was also a subject of public interest, and he underwent a major knee-replacement surgery at the Breach Candy Hospital in Mumbai to


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 relieve intense pressure upon his legs.In March 2001, the Tehelka group released a sting operation video named Operation West End which showed BJP president Bangaru Laxman, senior army officers and NDA members accepting bribes from journalists posing as agents and businessmen. The Defence Minister George Fernandes was forced to resign following the Barak Missile scandal involving the botched supplies of coffins for the soldiers killed in Kargil, and the findings of an inquiry commission that the government could have prevented the Kargil invasion. Vajpayee initiated talks with Pakistan, and invited Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf to Agra for a joint summit. President Musharraf was believed to be the principal architect of the Kargil War in India. By accepting him as the President of Pakistan, Vajpayee chose to move forward leaving behind the Kargil War. But after three days of much fanfare, which included Musharraf visiting his birthplace in Delhi, the summit failed to achieve a breakthrough as President Musharraf declined to leave aside the issue of Kashmir. 2001 attack on Parliament

On 13 December 2001, a group of masked, armed men with fake IDs stormed Parliament House in Delhi.The terrorists managed to kill several security guards, but the building was sealed off swiftly and security forces cornered and killed the men who were later proven to be Pakistan nationals. Vajpayee ordered Indian troops to mobilise for war, leading to an estimated 500,000 to 750,000 Indian soldiers positioned along the international border between India and Pakistan. Pakistan responded by mobilising its own troops along the border. A terrorist attack on an army garrison in Kashmir in May 2002 further escalated


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 the situation. As the threat of war between two nuclear capable countries and the consequent possibility of a nuclear exchange loomed large, international diplomatic mediation focused on defusing the situation. In October 2002, both India and Pakistan announced that they would withdraw their troops from the border. The <mask> administration brought in the Prevention of Terrorism Act in 2002.The act was aimed at curbing terrorist threats by strengthening powers of government authorities to investigate and act against suspects. It was passed in a joint session of the parliament, amidst concerns that the law would be misused. Another political disaster hit his government between December 2001 and March 2002: the VHP held the Government hostage in a major standoff in Ayodhya over the Ram temple. On the 10th anniversary of the destruction of the Babri mosque, the VHP wanted to perform a shila daan, or a ceremony laying the foundation stone of the cherished temple at the disputed site. Thousands of VHP activists amassed and threatened to overrun the site and forcibly perform the ceremony. A grave threat of not only communal violence, but an outright breakdown of law and order owing to the defiance of the government by a religious organisation hung over the nation. The incident, however, ended peacefully with a symbolic handover of a stone at a different location 1 km away from the disputed site.2002 Gujarat violence

In February 2002, a train filled with Hindu pilgrims returning to Gujarat from Ayodhya stopped in the town of Godhra. A scuffle broke out between Hindu activists and Muslim residents, and the train was set on fire, leading to the deaths of 59 people. The charred bodies of the victims were


texts: displayed in public in the city of Ahmedabad, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad called for a statewide strike in Gujarat. These decisions stoked anti-Muslim sentiments. Blaming Muslims for the deaths, rampaging Hindu mobs killed thousands of Muslim men and women, destroying Muslim homes and places of worship. The violence raged for more than two months, and more than 1,000 people died. Gujarat was being ruled by a BJP government, with Narendra Modi as the chief minister.The state government was criticised for mishandling the situation. It was accused of doing little to stop the violence, and even being complicit in encouraging it. <mask> reportedly wanted to remove Modi, but was eventually prevailed upon by party members to not act against him. He travelled to Gujarat, visiting Godhra, and Ahmedabad, the site of the most violent riots. He announced financial aid for victims, and urged an end to the violence. While he condemned the violence, he did not chastise Modi directly in public. When asked as to what would be his message to the chief minister in the event of the riots having taking place, <mask> responded that Modi must follow raj dharma, Hindi for ethical governance.At the meeting of the BJP national executive in Goa in April 2002, <mask>'s speech generated controversy for its contents which included him saying: "Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others." The Prime Minister's Office stated that these remarks had been taken out of context. <mask> was accused of doing nothing to stop the violence, and later admitted mistakes in handling the events. K. R. Narayanan, then president of India, also blamed <mask>'s government for failing to quell the violence. After


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 the BJP's defeat in the 2004 general elections, Vajpayee admitted that not removing Modi had been a mistake. 2002–2004
In late 2002 and 2003 the government pushed through economic reforms. The country's GDP growth exceeded 7% every year from 2003 to 2007, following three years of sub-5% growth.Increasing foreign investment, modernisation of public and industrial infrastructure, the creation of jobs, a rising high-tech and IT industry and urban modernisation and expansion improved the nation's international image. Good crop harvests and strong industrial expansion also helped the economy. In May 2003, he announced before the parliament that he would make one last effort to achieve peace with Pakistan. The announcement ended a period of 16 months, following the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament, during which India had severed diplomatic ties with Pakistan. Although diplomatic relations did not pick up immediately, visits were exchanged by high-level officials and the military standoff ended. The Pakistani President and Pakistani politicians, civil and religious leaders hailed this initiative as did the leaders of the United States, Europe and much of the world. In July 2003, Prime Minister Vajpayee visited China, and met with various Chinese leaders.He recognised Tibet as a part of China, which was welcomed by the Chinese leadership, and which, in the following year, recognised Sikkim as part of India. China–India relations improved greatly in the following years. Policies
Vajpayee's government introduced many domestic economic and infrastructural reforms, including encouraging the private sector and foreign investments, reducing governmental waste, encouraging research and development and


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 privatisation of some government owned corporations. Among Vajpayee's projects were the National Highways Development Project and Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana. In 2001, the Vajpayee government launched the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan campaign, aimed at improving the quality of education in primary and secondary schools. 2004 general election
In 2003, news reports suggested a tussle within the BJP with regard to sharing of leadership between Vajpayee and Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani. BJP president Venkaiah Naidu had suggested that Advani must lead the party politically at the 2004 general elections, referring to Vajpayee as vikas purush, Hindi for development man, and Advani as loh purush, iron man.When Vajpayee subsequently threatened retirement, Naidu backtracked, announcing that the party would contest the elections under the twin leadership of <mask> and Advani. The NDA was widely expected to retain power after the 2004 general election. It announced elections six months ahead of schedule, hoping to capitalise on economic growth, and Vajpayee's peace initiative with Pakistan. The 13th Lok Sabha was dissolved before the completion of its term. The BJP hoped to capitalise on a perceived 'feel-good factor' and BJP's recent successes in the Assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. Under the "India Shining" campaign, it released ads proclaiming the economic growth of the nation under the government. However, the BJP could only win 138 seats in the 543-seat parliament, with several prominent cabinet ministers being defeated.The NDA coalition won 185 seats. The Indian National Congress, led by Sonia Gandhi, emerged as the single largest party, winning 145 seats in the


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 election. The Congress and its allies, comprising many smaller parties, formed the United Progressive Alliance, accounting for 220 seats in the parliament. <mask> resigned as prime minister. The UPA, with the outside support of communist parties, formed the next government with Manmohan Singh as the prime minister. Post-premiership
In December 2005, <mask> announced his retirement from active politics, declaring that he would not contest in the next general election. In a famous statement at the BJP's silver jubilee rally at Mumbai's Shivaji Park, Vajpayee announced that "Henceforth, Lal Krishna Advani and Pramod Mahajan will be the Ram-Lakshman [the two godly brothers much revered and worshipped by Hindus] of the BJP."<mask> was referred to as the Bhishma Pitamah of Indian politics by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during a speech in the Rajya Sabha, a reference to the character in the Hindu epic Mahabharata who was held in respect by two warring sides. Vajpayee was hospitalised at All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi (AIIMS) for a chest infection and fever on 6 February 2009. He was put on ventilator support as his condition worsened but he eventually recuperated and was later discharged. Unable to participate in the campaign for the 2009 general election due to his poor health, he wrote a letter urging voters to back the BJP. His protege Lalji Tandon was able to retain the Lucknow seat in that election even though the NDA suffered electoral reverses all over the country. It was speculated that Vajpayee's non-partisan appeal contributed to Lalji's success in Lucknow in contrast to that BJP's poor performance elsewhere in Uttar Pradesh. Positions held

Personal life
Vajpayee


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 remained a bachelor for his entire life.He adopted and raised Namita Bhattacharya as his own child, the daughter of longtime friend Rajkumari Kaul and her husband B. N. Kaul. His adopted family lived with him. Unlike purist Brahmins who shun meat and alcohol, Vajpayee was known to be fond of whisky and meat. He was a noted poet, writing in Hindi. His published works include Kaidi Kaviraj Ki Kundalian, a collection of poems written during the 1975–77 emergency, and Amar aag hai. With regard to his poetry he wrote, "My poetry is a declaration of war, not an exordium to defeat. It is not the defeated soldier's drumbeat of despair, but the fighting warrior's will to win.It is not the despirited voice of dejection but the stirring shout of victory." Death

Vajpayee suffered a stroke in 2009 which impaired his speech. His health had been a major source of concern; reports said he was confined to a wheelchair and failed to recognise people. He also suffered from dementia and long-term diabetes. For many years, he had not attended any public engagements and rarely ventured out of the house, except for checkups at the All India Institutes of Medical Sciences. On 11 June 2018, Vajpayee was admitted to AIIMS in critical condition following a kidney infection. He was officially declared dead there at 5:05 pm IST on 16 August 2018 at the age of 93.Some sources claim that he had died on the previous day. On the morning of 17 August, <mask>'s body, draped with the Indian flag, was taken to the Bharatiya Janata Party headquarters where party workers paid their tributes until 1 pm. Later that afternoon at 4 pm, <mask> was cremated with full state honours at Rashtriya Smriti Sthal near Raj Ghat, and his pyre was

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 lit by his foster daughter Namita Kaul Bhattacharya. Thousands of people and many dignitaries attended his funeral procession, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Ram Nath Kovind. On 19 August, his ashes were immersed in Ganga river at Haridwar by Kaul. Reactions and tributes on his death
India reacted to <mask>'s death with grief and thousands of tributes poured in through social media platforms. Thousands of people paid their respects during his funeral procession.A seven-day state mourning was announced by the central government throughout India. The national flag flew half-mast during this period. : Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai was among several foreign dignitaries present at former Prime Minister <mask> <mask> Vajpayee's funeral in New Delhi. He recalled that the departed leader was "the first to offer us civilian planes, Airbuses at the time we were starting out". : Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina expressed "deep shock" at the demise of former Indian Prime Minister <mask> <mask> Vajpayee and said it is a day of great sadness for the people of Bangladesh. Paying tribute to Vajpayee, Hasina termed him as "one of the most famous sons of India" and a highly respected person in Bangladesh. : Bhutan king Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck attended the funeral ceremony in New Delhi.China: In a statement, the ministry of foreign affairs said the Indian leader was an "outstanding Indian statesman and had made outstanding contributions to the development of Sino-Indian relations". "China expresses its deep condolences on his death and sincere condolences to the Indian government and people and the relatives of Mr Vajpayee. Premier Li Keqiang has sent a condolence message

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texts: to the leaders of India," the statement said. : Remembering Vajpayee's visit to Japan in 2001, the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe said, "On behalf of the Government and people of Japan, I would like to convey my sincerest condolences to the Government and people of India and the bereaved family. His Excellency Vajpayee visited Japan in 2001 as the then-Prime Minister and made significant contributions to the friendship between our two countries as a good friend of Japan. It is him who established the cornerstone of Japan-India relations today". Terming Vajpayee as an eminent leader of India, Abe added, "I pray from the bottom of my heart that his soul may rest in peace".: On 17 August, the government of Mauritius announced that both Mauritian and Indian flags would fly at half mast in the honour of Vajpayee. During the World Hindi Conference in Mauritius, PM Pravind Jugnauth announced that the cyber tower towards which Vajpayee contributed to be set up in Mauritius would be henceforth named as Atal Bihari Vajpayee tower. : Pakistan's interim Minister for Law and Information Syed Ali Zafar met External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and extended Pakistan's condolence on the death of former prime minister <mask> <mask> <mask>. Zafar was among the foreign dignitaries who attended Vajpayee's funeral in New Delhi. Former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf mourned the demise of former prime minister <mask> <mask> Vajpayee, calling him a great man. He said that Vajpayee's demise was a great loss for both India as well as Pakistan. : Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a message of condolences to President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the demise of Vajpayee.Putin termed the

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texts: former prime minister as "outstanding statesman". "<mask> <mask> Vajpayee rightly commanded great respect around the world. He will be remembered as a politician who made a major personal contribution to the friendly relations and privileged strategic partnership between our countries. The President of Russia conveyed words of sincere sympathy and support to the family of the deceased, the Government and the people of India", the message read. : Various Sri Lankan leaders paid rich tribute to the three-time PM, hailing him as a "friend of Sri Lanka". In a tweet President Maithripala Sirisena said: "Today, we have lost a great humanist and a true friend of Sri Lanka. Former Prime Minister of India <mask> <mask> <mask> was a visionary leader and an ardent defender of democracy.My condolences to his family and millions of his admirers around the world". Leader of Opposition R. Sampanthan said that India has lost one of its "most regarded intellectual[s] and [statesmen]". "He served the great country of India with humility and honesty, and he was much loved and respected by millions of people across the world. Former three-time Prime Minister Vajpayee is also an exceptional orator and a leader with a great sense of humour, his speeches within the Indian parliament and outside will always be remembered", he said in a statement, extending his condolences on behalf of the Tamil people of Sri Lanka. : U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said Vajpayee recognised early on that the US-India partnership would contribute to the world's economic prosperity and security and the two democracies would continue to benefit from his vision. "On behalf of the people of the United States of America, I extend my

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