Philip Dunton Murphy (born August 16, 1957) is an American financier, diplomat, and politician serving as the 56th governor of New Jersey since 2018. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the United States ambassador to Germany from 2009 to 2013 under President Barack Obama.

Murphy had a 23-year career at Goldman Sachs, where he held several high-level positions and accumulated considerable wealth before retiring in 2006. He is involved in many civic organizations and philanthropic pursuits. He served as finance chairman for the Democratic National Committee in the mid-late 2000s under Howard Dean. In the Obama administration, Murphy served as the United States ambassador to Germany from 2009 to 2013, during which time he dealt with the international fallout from the United States diplomatic cables leak.

While planning to run for governor, Murphy and his wife Tammy Murphy launched New Start New Jersey, a progressive organization active from November 2014 to December 2017, intended to increase his political visibility in the state. He defeated then-Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno in the 2017 gubernatorial election with 56% of the vote. In December 2019, Murphy became the chairperson of the Democratic Governors Association, a position he held for a year. He was reelected in an unexpectedly close race in 2021, defeating Republican nominee Jack Ciattarelli with 51.2% of the vote, becoming the first Democratic governor of New Jersey to win a second term since Brendan Byrne in 1977. In July 2022, Murphy became the first National Governors Association chair from New Jersey.

Early life and education

Murphy was born in Needham, Massachusetts, and was raised in both Needham and nearby Newton, the son of Dorothy Louise (Dunton) and Walter F. Murphy.

The family was Irish American, with Phil being third generation. According to Murphy, his household was "middle class on a good day;" by his recollection, his mother, a secretary, and father, a high-school dropout who took any job he could (including liquor store manager and for-pay pallbearer), lived paycheck to paycheck.

Both of his parents were enthusiastic supporters of John F. Kennedy and volunteered for his campaign in the 1952 United States Senate election in Massachusetts. Murphy played soccer as a boy, an interest that stayed with him in later life. His mother believed strongly in the importance of education, and Phil and his three older siblings all earned college degrees.

Murphy graduated from Needham High School, along with future Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, in 1975. He graduated from Harvard University in 1979 with an AB degree in economics. At Harvard he aspired to become a professional musical theater performer and was elected president of the Hasty Pudding Theatricals, a theatrical student society. He then attended the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, where he received a MBA in 1983.

Career

Personal wealth
Murphy's position at Goldman Sachs when the firm had its IPO brought his net worth above $50 million. By one estimate, reported in Der Spiegel in 2009, his wealth after leaving the firm was in the range of several hundred million dollars.

Murphy moved to Middletown Township, New Jersey, in the late 1990s. He and his family live in a riverside estate with a six-figure annual property tax bill. Murphy also owns homes in Germany and Italy.

In 2016 Murphy released five years' worth of federal tax returns. In 2014 he earned about $6 million, paid about $2 million in taxes for an effective tax rate of 34%, and directly or indirectly donated 24% of his income to charity. The returns for the other years showed effective tax rates ranging between 32% and 39%. Murphy's charitable donations during these five years averaged about $980,000 a year. Due to his wealth and the complicated nature of his holdings, his federal tax filings have been known to exceed 300 pages in length.

Finance career

Goldman Sachs
Murphy began his career with a summer associate internship at Goldman Sachs in 1982. He was hired after graduating in 1983. He rose in the ranks quickly, later attributing that success to his ability to make deals: "Two people may not like each other and can't work together. Their mutual dislike is their problem. I don't let it become mine. I'll be the man in the middle and the three of us can work out something everybody is happy with."

From 1993 to 1997 Murphy headed the firm's Frankfurt office. His business responsibilities were later expanded to encompass Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, as well as in the emerging post-Warsaw Pact economies of Central Europe. In this role he engaged in a number of transactions with the German government's Treuhandanstalt agency, whose purpose was to conduct the privatization of formerly state-owned enterprises within the boundaries of no-longer-extant East Germany. Murphy was also active in the Atlantik-Brücke organization, including co-founding its International Advisor Council.

From 1997 to 1999 Murphy served as the President of Goldman Sachs (Asia). In that capacity, he was officed in Hong Kong. During this time Goldman Sachs profited from its investment in Yue Yuen Industrial Holdings, a shoe manufacturer that became notorious for its harsh labor practices. The $55 million investment was made the year before Murphy took the Asia post and it is unclear to what extent Murphy was aware of the firm's operational characteristics. In 1998 Murphy told the Wall Street Journal that "We [at Goldman Sachs] are elite in the sense the Marine Corps is elite".

In 1999 Murphy secured a spot on the firm's management committee. There his colleagues included Hank Paulson and Gary Cohn, both of whom later served at highest levels of the federal government. This coincided with the repeal of Glass–Steagall; the repeal allowed Murphy and his colleagues to make much greater use of leverage and profoundly changed how the company generated profits.

In 2001 Murphy became global co-head of the firm's Investment Management Division. This unit oversaw the investments of foundations, pensions, hedge funds, and wealthy personages, and by 2003 had amassed $373 billion in holdings. Hedge funds, in particular, received large lines of credit from Murphy's unit. Another company initiative that Murphy helped to undertake was the unit that did major business in the emerging markets within the EMEA region.

In 2003 Murphy's day-to-day responsibilities at the firm ended, and he became a Senior Director of the firm. He retired in 2006. Murphy spent 23 years at Goldman Sachs in all.

Democratic Party finance chair
After leaving Goldman Sachs, Murphy served from 2006 to 2009 as the National Finance Chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), where he worked with DNC Chair Howard Dean. Murphy liked both Dean's vision for the party and the discipline Dean brought to the task, and the two became close friends.

It was Murphy who financed Dean's "50-state strategy". The strategy was opposed by powerful Democrats in Congress such as Charles Schumer and Rahm Emanuel, but Murphy refused to visibly engage in this dispute, saying, "I'm a sucker for the view that you have it out in the locker room, not in public."  Former Goldman Sachs colleague and U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Robert Rubin said of Murphy's ability to handle the new position, "He has very substantial technical expertise from his corporate finance work, but he combines that with a wonderful facility for dealing with people." Dean later said that Murphy well learned the lesson not all such figures of commerce understand: that while in business you can command people to do things, in politics things are never so simple.

During his first year, Murphy focused on gaining donations from his contacts from his university years and Goldman Sachs; within that year he was able to substantially reduce the DNC's gap with the Republican National Committee. In all, Murphy says he raised $300 million for the DNC.

Murphy was also a big donor to Democratic candidates, giving them almost $1.5 million by 2009. This included modest contributions to individual candidates and several six-figure sums to party committees. During the hotly contested 2008 Democratic presidential primaries he was a superdelegate but remained uncommitted for most of the contest.

Civic activities

Murphy has been appointed to the boards or committees of various civic or philanthropic groups. Among these are the NAACP, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation, the Center for American Progress, 180 Turning Lives Around, and several programs of the University of Pennsylvania such as the Huntsman Program in International Studies and Business and the Wharton School Graduate Executive and Asian Program. Other such entities include the Goldman Sachs Foundation, the Investment Company Institute, and Prosperity New Jersey. He has served as the grand marshal of the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Rumson, New Jersey, several times.

Murphy has helped lead local charities to support troubled teens and domestic abuse survivors. He and his wife founded 2nd Floor, a teen helpline in New Jersey that had fielded 700,000 calls by 2015 and that has helped save lives.

In 2004–2005 Murphy co-chaired a national task force on 21st-century public education for the Center for American Progress that featured fellow co-chairs Governor of Arizona Janet Napolitano and academic and civil rights figure Roger Wilkins.
The Renewing Our Schools, Securing Our Future task force issued a report called "Getting Smarter, Becoming Fairer: A Progressive Education Agenda For A Stronger Nation". It called for a longer school day, a reorganized school year, and extending learning scenarios to the pre-kindergarten and post-high school domains.

The Murphy family's time in Germany made them all soccer enthusiasts. Murphy has served on the boards of the U.S. Soccer Foundation and the U.S. Soccer Federation World Cup Bid Committee for 2018 and 2022. He owns a stake in the professional New Jersey women's soccer club NJ/NY Gotham FC; he has said that he knows the club is a money-losing venture but that he wanted to show his soccer-playing daughter that women's professional soccer can exist in the United States.

New Jersey Benefits Task Force chair
In May 2005 Acting Governor Richard Codey named Murphy to chair the New Jersey Benefits Task Force on public sector employee benefits in response to the New Jersey pension crisis, a particularly long-running instance of the state-level pensions crises taking place nationwide.

The task force reported its findings in December 2005. By this time Murphy was already considered to be retired from Goldman Sachs. The report decried past state practices, saying that "gimmicks" had been constructed instead of genuine solutions.

As chair, Murphy recommended the sale of publicly owned assets. For the most part that did not happen, but some of his other suggestions, such as raising the age of retirement and recalculating how pensions related to salary earned, were taken. Labor unions opposed the recommendations, with leader Carla Katz saying, "We will fight vigorously and loudly against any cuts to our pensions or health benefits proposed by the task force." The New York Times wrote that "no matter what happens, the report's legacy may well be that it tried to tackle the issues head-on."

U.S. Ambassador to Germany

Murphy served as United States Ambassador to Germany under President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013. The possibility of his being named to the post was first reported by Spiegel Online International in May 2009. The former U.S. Ambassador John Kornblum supported the choice, saying, "Murphy has been involved in German-American relations for many years. He's a good choice." An agrément was issued, and Obama formally nominated him to the position on July 9. Murphy was confirmed by the United States Senate on August 7, and appeared with his family in Berlin on August 21. That they arrived in an expensive Gulfstream V executive jet irked Chancellor Merkel, who saw it as evidence of the long practice of presidents awarding wealthy donors with ambassadorships. Murphy presented his credentials in Berlin to German President Horst Koehler on September 3, which the State Department considers his effective start date. He was sworn into the position on September 13.

During his tenure, Murphy promoted American trade and focused on engaging Germany's youth through town hall meetings, exchange programs, and social media communication. He said, "The legacy of our time together in Germany will be measured by how well we 'set the table' for tomorrow, by how deeply today's youth understand the ongoing relevance of the transatlantic bridge. They are tomorrow's leaders and our investment in their future is our highest priority." In doing so he paid particular attention to children who had immigrated to Germany, who rarely had the opportunity to meet Americans.

The United States diplomatic cables leak, published by WikiLeaks in 2010, contained negative statements Murphy signed about senior German politicians, including a remark by Murphy that Merkel was "insecure" and unfavorable comments by embassy staff about Guido Westerwelle, the German foreign minister. Some German officials expressed desire that Murphy be recalled. In response, Murphy appeared on German television outlets such as ZDF in an attempt at damage control. In Spiegel Online, he said, "I'm a big boy. At the end of the day, the buck stops with me," and that he would not "apologize for one speck" of what his staff had done. On December 5, he apologized for the leak in Welt am Sonntag. Murphy later said that the episode was "incredibly awkward and embarrassing" but that the two countries worked through it, and that in the end Germany-United States relations were stronger than ever.

Regarding the European debt crisis, Murphy said in 2013, "The big debate in Europe, which I think is a false debate, is either fiscal consolidation or growth. And the reality is that Europe needs both: it needs fiscal consolidation and growth." Regarding economic differences between the nations, he said, "Germany believes strongly that the first order of business is to cut your debts and deficits and from that, good things will come. We're more likely to say a little bit of stimulus will jump-start things, even if it means incurring more debt. But you work your way through those issues."

On May 29, 2013, it was announced that Murphy was stepping down from the post. He was still ambassador as of July 3; he returned to the United States at some point during July and formally stayed in the role until his mission terminated on August 26.

Entry into New Jersey politics
Murphy was mentioned as a potential candidate in the 2013 New Jersey gubernatorial election, but did not run. Rather, upon returning to the United States he returned to Murphy Endeavors LLC, a business management consultancy firm, of which he was the principal, with offices in Red Bank, New Jersey. He started the firm in 2009 after leaving the DNC position, but it was soon put on hold due to his ambassadorial nomination. He also gave speeches about his experiences in Germany, especially in connection with the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

New Start New Jersey
In 2014 Murphy created New Start New Jersey, a nonprofit progressive policy think tank that held a number of events around New Jersey. His wife was co-founder, chair, and secretary. The organization said it would neither endorse nor fund political candidates, as it was barred from doing so, but it did serve to raise Murphy's political visibility. Its events included an appearance by singer Jon Bon Jovi. One of its goals was to help displaced workers back into the work force. (Making reference to visibility, in 2016 hacked Podesta emails revealed that Murphy was already seriously considering a run for governor when the organization was founded, telling Podesta that his ambitions were "very serious but not yet committed" and that the new entity would improve his name recognition.)

New Way for New Jersey
In September 2015 Murphy launched a progressive organization named New Way for New Jersey, which held a number of town halls, including some by telephone on Sunday evenings, and encouraged Democrats to sign petitions critical of incumbent Governor Chris Christie. Unlike New Start New Jersey, New Way for New Jersey was an explicitly political organization.

Criticism of Chris Christie
On March 2, 2016, Murphy's organization New Way for New Jersey launched a petition that criticized Christie for neglecting his duties as governor due to his travel and support of Donald Trump's presidential campaign. The group implored Christie to "do your job or quit". Murphy supported Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primary and fundraised for her.

After Murphy announced his candidacy for governor, New Way for New Jersey folded. New Start New Jersey continued, albeit without Murphy on its board.

Campaigns for governor

2017

In May 2016 Murphy announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination in the 2017 New Jersey gubernatorial election. He became the race's first announced candidate. He said of his rationale, "I am running for governor because New Jersey desperately needs adult leadership that puts our people first."

Announcing so early was unusual. Comparisons with unpopular former governor Jon Corzine, another wealthy former Goldman Sachs executive, were a challenge Murphy had to meet. Murphy also began the campaign with little name recognition. He initially planned to lend $10 million to the campaign but to also aggressively fund-raise. He said he would accept no so-called dark money and that "I'm holding our campaign to a higher standard."

Democratic primary

Murphy was the first declared Democratic candidate for governor, although several other candidates were expected to run. Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, Assemblyman John Wisniewski of Sayreville, State Senator Raymond Lesniak, and State Senate President Stephen M. Sweeney of Gloucester County were often mentioned in news media along with other candidates. Fulop and Sweeney were geographic rivals, and in terms of state party organizational support, Max Pizarro of the New York Observer characterized Murphy as "everyone's number two choice. If Fulop or Sweeney stumbles, Murphy could rocket from zero to 100 overnight."

On September 28, 2016, Fulop announced he would not run for governor and endorsed Murphy. On October 6, Sweeney announced he too would not run, citing apparent party support for Murphy, whom he endorsed. The move came as Murphy was corralling dozens of endorsements, including all of those from North Jersey county party committees and the most populous Central Jersey county committees.

As a result of these withdrawals Murphy became the clear front-runner for the nomination, but Wisniewski and Lesniak, the two best-known remaining potential candidates, both said they still intended to run.

After the unexpected result of the 2016 United States presidential election, Murphy noted that the fortunes of the state Democratic Party had improved in the election, saying, "As with so many, I am disappointed by the [presidential] results from Tuesday. But I refuse to be discouraged. And I won't be dissuaded from working to make New Jersey a fairer, more just place for all of us." Murphy subsequently drew criticism from the New Jersey Lieutenant Governor and Republican candidate for governor, Kim Guadagno, for seeming to draw a comparison between the Trump campaign and the early years of the Nazi rise to power in Germany.

On November 15, Wisniewski, who gained visibility as a leader of the Fort Lee lane closure scandal investigations, announced his run for governor. In his message he implicitly criticized Murphy, saying "I'm not a Wall Street executive. I haven't made hundreds of millions of dollars by outsourcing jobs. I've learned the value of public service..."

In January 2017 Murphy was endorsed by New Jersey's two U.S. senators, Bob Menendez and Cory Booker. He also had the endorsements of all 21 county party organizations. In statewide races, these designations offer favorable ballot position, which some voters pick by default, and are often central to success.

By February 2017 Murphy was leading by a solid margin in a Quinnipiac Poll both for the Democratic nomination and in a putative general election matchup against Guadagno. Another poll was less certain, showing most voters undecided.

Two debates with his main Democratic rivals, including former U.S. Treasury official Jim Johnson along with Wiesiewski and Lesniak, were held within a short span of time in May; during the second Murphy found himself under sustained attack by his rivals, but defended himself by staking out very progressive positions. Politico wrote, "Underdogs Jim Johnson, Ray Lesniak and John Wisniewski savaged the front-runner, Phil Murphy, accusing him during the 90-minute televised contest of buying off party bosses and being disingenuous on environmental issues." Subsequent campaigning by those three continued to emphasize that Murphy was "buying" the election. Nonetheless, polls continued to show Murphy with a sizable lead over all rivals.

With $19 million raised, of which $15 million was his own money, Murphy continued to spend the most of all the candidates; his spending was more than twice that of all the other Democratic and Republican candidates for governor combined. He also donated $1.5 million to the various county party organizations as well as to some candidates for local offices. Murphy captured the endorsement of the first major national figure to inject himself into the race, former Vice President Joe Biden. Additionally, he was endorsed by former Vice President Al Gore, which helped solidify Murphy's environmentalist credentials after some attacks on his role as a financier investing in fracking operations. He also had the fundraising support of wealthy entertainment figures Jon Bon Jovi and Whoopi Goldberg. Most, though not all, of the key labor unions in the state, also supported Murphy. Nevertheless, there was still a sense of apathy about the election on the part of the state's voters; as the New York Times stated shortly before the primary vote, "a majority of voters still say they 'don't know' who to vote for and are not doing much to find out."

Murphy won the June 6 primary decisively, with 48% of the vote. Johnson and Wisniewski finished second and third with 22% apiece, Lesniak got 5%, and scattered others less.

General election
Murphy faced Guadagno, the Republican nominee, in the November general election. In that campaign Guadagno ran as a moderate, attempting to avoid association with both Christie, who held a record-low approval rating for a governor, and Donald Trump. Instead she sought to focus on Murphy's Goldman Sachs background.

On July 26, Murphy announced Assemblywoman and Speaker Emerita Sheila Oliver as his running mate.

Murphy won the general election with approximately 56% of the vote, an overall percentage similar to the previous winning non-incumbent Democrat, Jim McGreevey, for said office (2001; 56.4%), almost completely wiping out the unusually large gains made by his predecessor, Chris Christie, in 2013 (60.3% of the vote - only the normally Democratic counties of Essex and Hudson voted for Christie's opponent, Barbara Buono; by contrast, Murphy won normally Democratic municipalities by margins more similar to Jon Corzine's in 2005, and pull roughly 50/50 Somerset County into the Democratic column for the first time since 1989.

Policy proposals
State bank: Murphy's campaign has suggested a North Dakota-style statewide investment bank as a way of boosting New Jersey's economy. The bank would supply loans to not just businesses but also college students. Moreover, it would have the effect of eliminating Wall Street firms – including his own former one – from participating in state financial activities.
Pensions: regarding the state's still-troubled pension system, Murphy has said that there are no easy answers but that "the state has to stand up for its side of the bargain. Period. If the state doesn't, there is no use having the second-paragraph discussion."
Marijuana: Murphy favors the legalization of recreational marijuana in New Jersey.
Minimum wage: In terms of employment under the law, Murphy supports the notion of a $15 minimum wage. He also favors guaranteed paid sick leave in New Jersey.
Affordable housing/builder's remedy debate: In summer 2017, amid heavy local outcry over overdevelopment of apartment complexes and concerns about wealthy developers exploiting the Mount Laurel doctrine to overbuild small towns, Murphy proposed a solution that would not require more forced building. "With smart investments, we can create thousands of units of much-needed affordable housing without building a single new building," he said.
 School desegregation. In 2018, members of Murphy's transition team filed a school desegregation lawsuit, Latino Action Network v. New Jersey.

2021

On October 1, 2020, Murphy announced he would seek reelection, with Oliver as his running mate. He ran unopposed in the 2021 Democratic primary after two challengers were disqualified. He defeated Republican nominee Jack Ciattarelli in the general election, albeit by much closer margin than in 2017, with his reelection campaign harmed by the long duration of some of the state-level COVID-19 executive orders. Murphy became New Jersey's first Democratic governor since Brendan Byrne, in 1977, to be reelected.

Governor of New Jersey

First term

On January 16, 2018, Murphy was sworn in as the 56th governor of New Jersey at the Trenton War Memorial, succeeding Chris Christie. In one of his first executive orders, Murphy signed to revive subsidies for wind power in the state. The following month he signed legislation committing New Jersey to the Paris Agreement, an international treaty on climate change. Murphy also ensured that the state sued the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for suspending the Clean Water Rule. In March, he signed legislation which automatically registers all those who apply for a driver's license or state ID to vote. By June, Murphy had signed legislation to permit sports betting in the state. In December, Murphy signed into law new legislation which would overhaul the way NJ Transit managed.

In April 2019, Murphy signed a law allowing terminally ill patients with less than six months to choose to end their lives with a doctor's assistance. A month later, he signed legislation expanding the time period during which alleged sexual assault victims could sue their alleged attackers. In June, Murphy signed a law restricting the use of solitary confinement in New Jersey prisons. In October, he announced his opposition to the construction of a new power plant in New Jersey Meadowlands in North Bergen.

Murphy's governorship in 2020 was dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The first case in the state was reported on March 5, and Murphy declared a state of emergency on March 9. He signed multiple executive orders in late March that ordered a lockdown of the entire state. By April, most schools and businesses had shut down, with students being required to learn from home. By the summer, Murphy had reopened most restaurants but imposed extensive mask mandates. By July, COVID-related deaths in the state neared 16,000 and over 100,000 residents had tested positive.

In the 2020 United States presidential election, Murphy initially endorsed New Jersey senator Cory Booker for the Democratic nomination. After Booker dropped out of the race in January 2020, Murphy announced he did not intend on endorsing any of the other candidates still in the race. After former vice president Joe Biden won the nomination, Murphy endorsed Biden.

In February 2021, Murphy signed multiple bills that liberalized the state's cannabis laws. The bills created a regulated cannabis industry in the state, permitted residents to carry up to six ounces of cannabis, and expunged 250,000 low-level cannabis arrests. Under the new laws, the scent of alcohol or cannabis can no longer be used to justify a search by law enforcement. In June, Murphy signed an executive order ending the COVID public health emergency, while retaining some executive privileges and restrictions. After winning reelection in November, Murphy said he intended to have every child in school by winter.

Second term
In July 2022, Murphy was elected chair of the National Governors Association, becoming the first person from New Jersey to hold the office.

In April 2023, Murphy intervened in the 2023 Rutgers University strike, inviting union representatives and the university administration to his office to negotiate. The strike ended after five days of negotiations led by Murphy. Murphy signed an executive order that would require all state departments and agencies to protect patients and health care professionals against legal repercussions for providing, receiving, assisting in providing or receiving, seeking, and traveling to New Jersey for gender-affirming health care services.

On July 21, Murphy filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration over New York's plan to implement congestion pricing in the most congested parts of Manhattan. He has argued that the program, which is intended to reduce air pollution and provide funding for public transit, violates the National Environmental Protection Act, which requires a full environmental impact review of projects. Environmentalists criticized Murphy for claiming to be an environmentalist while trying to stop congestion pricing from going into effect in one of the world's most polluted and congested areas.

From July 28 until August 13, Murphy went on vacation, during which time Lieutenant Governor Sheila Oliver became acting governor. On July 31, Oliver was rushed to the Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center for a medical emergency; she died on August 1. New Jersey Senate President Nicholas Scutari served as acting governor until Murphy returned.

Approval ratings
In April 2018, a poll found that Murphy was approved by a plurality of New Jersey residents, with 44 percent approving and 28 percent disapproving of his performance as governor; another 28 percent said they had no opinion. In February 2019, a Monmouth University survey found that Murphy's approval rating had slipped to 43 percent and his disapproval rating had risen to 40 percent. For most of 2019, Murphy ranked among the 10 least popular governors in the U.S., according to U.S. News & World Report.

A September 2019 Monmouth University survey found that 41 percent of New Jersey residents approved of Murphy and 38 percent disapproved. Another survey showed that 31 percent felt that Murphy's policies had hurt the middle class in the state, while only 17 percent said they had benefited.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Murphy's approval rating saw a sizable uptick; a July 2020 Fairleigh Dickinson University poll found that Murphy's approval rating had increased to 67 percent, and it remained above 60 percent for the rest of the year. By mid-2023, polling indicated that opinion of Murphy's governorship had become considerably more divided, with Rutgers-Eagleton and Monmouth University surveys finding that his approval ratings had fallen to 47 and 50 percent respectively.

Awards and honors
In 2015, Murphy received an honorary degree from Hamilton College. In 2019, he received an honorary degree from Rutgers University.

 2022 Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany

Personal life
Murphy first met his future wife, Tammy Snyder, in 1987 when they both worked at Goldman Sachs, but Murphy did not ask her out for another six years. When he finally did, things progressed quickly: they became engaged 18 days later and were married within six months, in 1993.

Murphy and his wife have four children, three sons and a daughter. They live in Monmouth County in New Jersey. The children have been educated at Rumson Country Day School and Phillips Academy. Tammy Snyder Murphy has held a variety of financial, civic, and political positions as well as having been a homemaker.

Murphy and his wife are part owners of NJ/NY Gotham FC (formerly Sky Blue FC), a professional women's soccer team. In 2018, media outlets reported that the team was "plagued by poor housing, subpar facilities, and mismanagement."

On March 4, 2020, Murphy underwent surgery in New York City to remove cancerous tumors in his kidneys. He made a full recovery shortly afterward.

Electoral history

References

Further reading
Final report of the New Jersey Benefits Task Force. December 1, 2005

External links

 Governor Phil Murphy official government website
 Murphy for Governor campaign website

United States Diplomatic Mission to Germany: The Ambassador (archived)

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1957 births
20th-century American businesspeople
21st-century American businesspeople
21st-century American diplomats
21st-century American politicians
Ambassadors of the United States to Germany
American financiers
American people of Irish descent
American philanthropists
Businesspeople from Massachusetts
Businesspeople from New Jersey
Center for American Progress people
Democratic Party governors of New Jersey
Goldman Sachs people
Hasty Pudding alumni
Living people
NJ/NY Gotham FC owners
People from Greater Boston
People from Middletown Township, New Jersey
Politicians from Needham, Massachusetts
Sports owners
United States Soccer Federation officials
Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania alumni

Phil Murphy


Ozod Muhiddinovna Aminova (October 1, 1933 – June 7, 2009) was a Soviet-Tajikistani poet, sometimes known by the mononym Ozod.

Born in Khujand, then called Leninabad, Aminova was the daughter of poet and musician Muhiddin Aminzoda. She graduated from the Pedagogical Institute in Khujand in 1958, and taught at local schools in that town until 1970; in that year she joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. In 1971, she became the editor of the local newspaper, Haqiqati Leninabad, remaining in this position until 1990, in which year she became an advisor to the local branch of the Writers' Union of Tajikistan, of which she had been a member since 1965. She also chaired the local Culture Fund. Aminova began publishing her work in the mid-1950s. She joined the Union of Writers of Tajikistan in 1965, and in 1982 won the Tajikistan Komsomol's Prize for her work. She also received the Honorary Order of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviets of Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. Aminova takes as the theme of her work such subjects as patriotism, love, loyalty, and the freedom of Soviet women. Much of her work was translated into Russian, and some poems were translated into the languages of other Soviet republics.

Publications
Satrhoi Nakhustin (The First Lines, 1965)
Ba Yodi Tu (Thinking of You, 1971)
Chashmi Bidor  (Wakeful Eye, 1975)
Didori Sahro (A Visit to the Fields, 1975, written to honor engineer Dilbarniso Nurmatova)
Modarnoma (In Praise of Mother, 1981)
Piroyai Sabz (Green Ornament, 1983)
Man Ham Maktabkhon Shudam (I, Too, Became Learned, 1981)
Guldasta (Bouquet, 1984)

References

1933 births
2009 deaths
Tajikistani women poets
Soviet women poets
20th-century Tajikistani poets
20th-century Tajikistani women writers
21st-century Tajikistani poets
21st-century Tajikistani writers
21st-century Tajikistani women writers
People from Khujand
Communist Party of the Soviet Union members

Ozod Aminova


The convent, cloister and chapel of Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria de la Popa are located at the top of Mount la Popa, in Cartagena de Indias, in Colombia. It is also called Convento de Santa Cruz de la Popa.

History
The religious complex dates back to 1607, when the original wooden chapel and palm of the Popa was erected, thanks to the preaching of the Discalced Augustinian friar Vicente Mallol.

A year later, the convent was built, initially called Santa Cruz, and afterwards it was given the name of la Popa, to have the shape of a galley, whose stern is the extremity where the church currently stands.

A wealthy Neapolitan, Don Fabricio Sánchez, paid the expenses, and once the ecclesiastical and civil procedures of rigor were fulfilled, Fray Alonso de la Cruz Paredes, of the order of the Augustinian Recollects, was named as superior of the convent of La Popa.

The chronicle says that while Friar Alonso de la Cruz Paredes in the convent of the Candelaria of Ráquira (a town of the Colombian Andean area), the Blessed Virgin appeared to him and ordered him to build a church on the hill closest to Cartagena, in order to return the Christian faith to this land, in which the legend says, inhabited an evil spirit, in the form of a goat, to which the mulattoes worshiped under the direction of the native Luis Andrea, who ended his days in a cell of the Inquisition.

The friar fulfilled his mission and threw the animal from the top of the hill. Since then, the Cartagena people call the precipice, the Salto del Cabrón, in allusion to the goat.

By 1612 the convent was almost finished and 15,000 ducats had been invested in it, a very respectable sum at the time. The construction took about 6 or 7 years to finish.

Unfortunately, there are few precise data on the convent, since the historical archives have completely disappeared because of the invasions it has undergone. From its beginnings, Popa has been the target of all eyes, including that of the pirates, who considered it as a fortified castle that had to be taken somehow. In 1585 the famous English pirate Francis Drake assaulted the Heroic City with a fleet of 23 ships and a force of 2,500 men. The attacks continued, this time affecting the convent of the Stern.

By the time the convent was attacked, Cartagena had already built its famous and imposing walls, which were its salvation; La Popa, on the other hand, had only the advantage of being withdrawn and raised above sea level; Something of this served her not to be totally devastated, although after each attack she was left to invest in it large sums of money in reparations.

In the course of the War of Independence, the convent of La Popa was a theater of heroic feats, such as the one carried out on the night of November 11, 1815, when the surprise assault of the Spanish besieging troops of Pablo Morillo was rejected.

During the Republic, the Augustinians were forced to leave the convent, and it was abandoned until it was used as a barracks. In fact, when the liberating troops entered Cartagena, Simón Bolívar settled there with his regiment. Tradition tells that a cannonball, fired from the Castle of San Felipe de Barajas, passed a few centimeters from the head of the Liberator, who was leaning in a window of the high floor of the convent.

Then, in 1961 the convent and the hermitage were returned to the Augustinians. At the moment the convent houses the Religious Museum, that can be visited along with the formidable cloister.

In February, the feast of the Virgen de la Candelaria de La Popa is celebrated. From the dawn of February 2, crowds of devotees make a pilgrimage on foot to the top of the hill of Popa.

Gallery

See also
List of colonial buildings in Cartagena, Colombia

References

External links

Roman Catholic churches in Cartagena, Colombia
Convents in Colombia
Spanish Colonial architecture in Colombia
1607 establishments in the Spanish Empire
Roman Catholic churches completed in 1613
17th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in Colombia

Convento de la Popa


James Crowe Richmond (22 September 1822 – 19 January 1898) was a New Zealand politician, engineer, and an early painter in watercolours of the New Zealand landscape.

Early life
Richmond was born in London, England, the son of Christopher Richmond, barrister and his wife, Maria Wilson. He was educated at Hackney Grammar School, at Hove House, Brighton and at the school attached to University College London. He was apprenticed to the engineer Samuel Clegg and from 1845 served on the staff of Isambard Kingdom Brunel for three years working on the Great Western Railway in southern England.

Richmond emigrated to New Zealand with his younger brother Henry Richmond on the Victory on 3 October 1850. The ship arrived in Auckland in February 1851 and the two walked south to Taranaki where they purchased a few acres near the home of their aunt Helen, who had married John Hursthouse and had also settled in Taranaki. Eventually members of the Richmond, Hursthouse, Atkinson and Ronald families, who were related by marriage, all settled near one another in the area.

Richmond returned to England in 1854 and married Mary Smith on 21 August 1856 before returning to New Zealand on the Kenilworth, which arrived in New Plymouth on 8 July 1857.

Political career

Richmond was elected unopposed as Member of Parliament for Omata at a 16 April 1860 by-election. He remained in Parliament until he resigned in 1865, as he was called to the Legislative Council, where he remained for only four months. He then represented Grey and Bell from 1866 to 1870, when he was defeated.

Mary had left for Nelson with other Taranaki refugees from the New Zealand Wars in 1860. In 1862 he joined her and became the editor of the Nelson Examiner while continuing his political career. After the fall of the Fox Ministry, he also became the Commissioner of Crown Lands. He served on the Nelson Provincial Council and was also appointed provincial secretary from 1863 to 1865.

Art

He formed a close and lifelong friendship with John Gully and continued to paint and sketch in what little spare time he had.

Later life
Mary died in Nelson on 29 October 1865 having never fully recovered from the birth of her fifth child, and this event left Richmond 'harassed & broken'. However, by 1866 he was back in politics and moved his family to Taranaki. By 1869 the family had moved back to Nelson. Other family connections were also living there, including his brother William's family and his sister Maria and her husband, Arthur Atkinson.

Richmond travelled with his three eldest children to England and Europe in 1873 but returned to Nelson by January 1881. He continued to travel frequently. His daughter Dorothy Kate Richmond was an artist and art teacher.

Death
Richmond died at the house of his daughter, Ann Elizabeth, in Ōtaki, which he was visiting, on 19 January 1898.

References

External links

Artworks by James Crowe Richmond in the collection of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
Biography in the 1966 Encyclopaedia of New Zealand
James Crowe Richmond, Artist (eText)
Fairfield House and the Atkinson and Richmond Families

1822 births
1898 deaths
English emigrants to New Zealand
Members of the New Zealand House of Representatives
Members of the New Zealand Legislative Council
Members of the Cabinet of New Zealand
Members of the Nelson Provincial Council
People from Taranaki
Unsuccessful candidates in the 1871 New Zealand general election
New Zealand MPs for North Island electorates
People from the London Borough of Hackney
19th-century New Zealand painters
19th-century New Zealand male artists
Atkinson–Hursthouse–Richmond family
Colonial Secretaries of New Zealand
19th-century New Zealand politicians
Engineers from London

James Crowe Richmond


ʻAbd al-Qayyūm (ALA-LC romanization of ) is a male Muslim given name. It is built from the Arabic words ʻabd and al-Qayyūm, one of the names of God in the Qur'an, which give rise to the Muslim theophoric names. It means "servant of the eternal".

It may refer to:

Abdul Qayyum
Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum (1863–1937), Indian educationalist
Abdul Qayyum Khan (1901–1981), Pakistani politician
Abdul Qayyum "Zakir", alleged real name of Abdullah Gulam Rasoul (born ca. 1973), Afghan held in Guantanamo
Abdul Qayyum (general), Pakistani Lieutenant General
Abdul Qayyum Jamal, Pakistani-Canadian accused of terrorism
Abdul Qayyum Sajjadi, Afghan politician
Mohammad Abdul Qayyum Khan (1924–2015), Azad Kashmir activist and politician

Abdul Qayum
Abdul Qayum Karzai (born 1947), Afghan politician, brother of Hamid Karzai
Abdul Qayum (imam) (born 1960), Bangladeshi-born British imam of the East London Mosque

Abdul Qayoom
Abdul Qayoom (cricketer) (born 1967), Indian cricketer and coach
Abdul Qayyum Sajjadi, Afghani politician representing Ghazni Province in Afghanistan's Wolesi Jirga

Others
Abdol Ghayoom Ebrahimi (born 1932), founder of Gorgan University, Iran
Maumoon Abdul Gayoom (born 1937), President of the Maldives
Abdul Kaium (born 1948), Bangladeshi police officer, Inspector General of Bangladesh Police (2005–2006)
Abdil Qaiyyim Mutalib (born 1989), Singapore footballer

References

Arabic-language masculine given names
Masculine given names

Abd al-Qayyum


Henry Halleck was a general in the United States army. He was born in 1815 in New York. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1839. He fought in the Mexican-American War. During the American Civil War, he became the commander of the Union armies in the Western Theater in 1862. In July 1862, Lincoln made Halleck the general-in-chief of all Union armies. However, Lincoln did not like the way Halleck ran the army, so in March 1864 Halleck was replaced as general-in-chief by U.S. Grant. Halleck was Grant's chief of staff and stayed in Washington, D.C. In 1865 he was transferred to the West Coast. In 1869, he was transferred to Kentucky, where he died in 1872.

1815 births
1872 deaths
American Civil War generals
Military people from New York (state)

Henry Halleck


William Bruce Robertson (18201886), Scottish divine, was born at Greenhill, St. Ninians, Stirling, 24 May 1820, and was educated at the University of Glasgow and at the Secession Theological Hall, Edinburgh, where he made the acquaintance of Thomas de Quincey, and on his recommendation went to the University of Halle and studied under Friedrich Tholuck.

After travelling in Italy and Switzerland he was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Stirling and Falkirk in 1843, and was soon after ordained at the United Secession Church (after 1847, the United Presbyterian Church) in Irvine, Ayrshire. In this charge he remained for 35 years, exercising from his pulpit a truly magnetic influence, not so discernible in his published sermons. From 1871 his health failed, in spite of several visits to Florence and the Riviera. He resigned his charge in 1878 and died at Bridge of Allan, 27 June 1886.

He wrote many hymns, among them a version of Dies Irae; several of them, together with letters, etc., are to be found in the Life by James Brown. A volume containing Robertson's lectures on Martin Luther and other subjects was published in 1892.

References

External links

Clergy from Stirling
Alumni of the University of Glasgow
19th-century Presbyterian ministers
19th-century Scottish writers
1820 births
1886 deaths
Ministers of Secession Churches in Scotland
Ministers of the United Presbyterian Church (Scotland)

William Bruce Robertson


Auslan () is the sign language used by the majority of the Australian Deaf community. The term Auslan is a portmanteau of "Australian Sign Language", coined by Trevor Johnston in the 1980s, although the language itself is much older. Auslan is related to British Sign Language (BSL) and New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL); the three have descended from the same parent language, and together comprise the BANZSL language family. Auslan has also been influenced by Irish Sign Language (ISL) and more recently has borrowed signs from American Sign Language (ASL).

As with other sign languages, Auslan's grammar and vocabulary is quite different from English. Its origin cannot be attributed to any individual; rather, it is a natural language that emerged spontaneously and has changed over time.

Recognition and status
Auslan was recognised by the Australian government as a "community language other than English" and the preferred language of the Deaf community in policy statements in 1987 and 1991. However, this recognition has yet to filter through to many institutions, government departments, and professionals who work with Deaf people.

The emerging status of Auslan has gone hand-in-hand with the advancement of the Deaf community in Australia, beginning in the early 1980s. In 1982, the registration of the first sign language interpreters by NAATI, a newly established regulatory body for interpreting and translating, accorded a sense of legitimacy to Auslan, furthered by the publishing of the first dictionary of Auslan in 1989 (Johnston, 1989). Auslan began to emerge as a language of instruction for Deaf students in primary and secondary schools from the late 1980s—mainly through the provision of Auslan/English interpreters in mainstream (hearing) schools with deaf support units, but also in some specialised bilingual programmes for deaf children. Boosted by the 1992 enactment of the federal Disability Discrimination Act, Auslan/English interpreters are also increasingly provided in tertiary education.

Today there is a growing number of courses teaching Auslan as a second language, from an elective language subject offered by some secondary schools to a two-year full-time diploma at TAFE.

Auslan content on television in Australia is limited. For some time, "Deaf TV", which was entirely in Auslan and was produced by Deaf volunteers, aired on community television station Channel 31 in Melbourne. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Auslan experienced a period of increased visibility through press conferences from federal and state leaders and health officials, which invariably featured Auslan interpreters. Since 2020, the ABC News channel's Sunday 5pm bulletin has included Auslan interpretation.

Prominent advocates for Auslan
In 2006 David Gibson was the first member of any Parliament in Australia to give a maiden speech in Auslan and was involved in Auslan events for the National Week of Deaf People at the Queensland Parliament, including the use of Auslan interpreters for question time and a debate between members of the deaf community and members of parliament on disability issues in 2007.

The Young Australian of the Year for 2015, Drisana Levitzke-Gray, is a strong proponent of Auslan and, in her acceptance speech using Auslan, called on the Government of Australia, and Australians, to learn and use Auslan as a natural language, as a human right for Australians.

History

Auslan evolved from sign language varieties brought to Australia during the nineteenth century from Britain and Ireland. The earliest record of a deaf Australian was convict Elizabeth Steel, who arrived in 1790 on the Second Fleet ship "Lady Juliana". There is as yet no historical evidence, however, that she used a sign language. One of the first known signing Deaf immigrants was the engraver John Carmichael who arrived in Sydney in 1825 from Edinburgh. He had been to a Deaf school there, and was known as a good storyteller in sign language.

Thirty-five years later, in 1860, a school for the Deaf was established by another Deaf Scotsman, Thomas Pattison—the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children in New South Wales. In Victoria just a few weeks later, the Victorian College for the Deaf was founded by a Deaf Englishman, Frederick J Rose, who had been educated at the Old Kent Road School in London. These schools and others had an enormous role in the development of Auslan, as they were the first contact with sign language for many Deaf children.  Because they were residential boarding schools, they provided ample opportunity for the language to thrive, even though in many schools, signing was banned from the classroom for much of the 20th century.

Irish Sign Language (ISL) also had an influence on the development of Auslan, as it was used in Catholic schools until the 1950s. The first Catholic school for Deaf children was established in 1875 by Irish nuns. As such, like Auslan evolving from BSL, Australian Irish Sign Language (or AISL) was born. Unlike British Sign Language, both ISL and AISL use a one-handed alphabet originating in French Sign Language (LSF), and although this alphabet has now almost disappeared from Australia, some initialised signs from the ISL/AISL manual alphabet are still used in Auslan.

In more recent times, Auslan has seen a significant amount of lexical borrowing from American Sign Language (ASL), especially in signs for technical terms. Some of these arose from the Signed English educational philosophies of the 1970s and 80s, when a committee looking for signs with direct equivalence to English words found them in ASL and/or in invented English-based signed systems used in North America and introduced them in the classroom. ASL contains many signs initialised from an alphabet which was also derived from LSF, and Auslan users, already familiar with the related ISL alphabet, accepted many of the new signs easily.

Grammar

Word Order
Previously, Auslan had been said to be an OSV, but more recent scholars have said that this idea is a false-equivalent of Auslan with spoken languages and that using anchor signs is not the same as word order. In general, word order in Auslan takes into account context and fluidity between signs being used, being less rigid than many spoken languages. Rather, Auslan instead follows the clause/word order off TTC—Time, topic, comment. The frequency of SVO in Auslan may come from code-switching with English (with very high bilingualism for Auslan users), as it is more common with "loan words (signs), English-based idiomatic phrases [and] fingerspelling" as well as by those who learned Auslan later in life.

In question phrases, the question word must always be at the end in Auslan in open questions. This word order is the same for both questions and statements, with questions in Auslan formed by either adding a question word at the end of a clause TOM KICKED PETER WHY or using nonmanual features of a questioning expression.

Verbs
Verbs in Auslan which are depicting signs use head-marking to show the semantic role of the arguments, rather than subject/object. An example of this is the word give, which involves an actor and a recipient. Both of these arguments can both be expressed on the verb by using signing space.

Verb-predicates can be formed by using individual vocabulary words in sequential order (more commonly used by anglophones who speak Auslan as a second language) or using depicting signs, which can "blur" word order, as it allows for multiple signs to be used at once. This is generally a mark of high competence and fluency in the language. Lexicalisation of common predicates is common, and compounding is the most common way that new lexical items are produced.

Auslan is a zero-copula language, which means that the verb to be is not used at all except when quoting English (in which it is finger-spelt). Auslan replaces copula with interrogatives for certain phrase types, sometimes in this context called "rhetorical questions" or "modifiers", using non-manual features to express that it is a statement rather than a question. The interrogatives of Auslan are more or less direct translations to English ones, with WHY used for this purpose sometimes translated as BECAUSE. Examples of use are as follows:

 Phoebe is an engineer : PHOEBE WHAT ENGINEER
 She is at school : SHE WHERE SCHOOL
 I went shopping with my sister : (BEFORE) I SHOP WITH WHO MY SISTER

Pronouns
Pronouns are established using the signing space, either arbitrary (for non-present people/things) or iconic. For example, "I will give you the doll tomorrow" would be signed as TOMORROW DOLL GIVE, with the sign GIVE starting at the speakers body and finishing at the receivers. The use of signing space also makes all pronouns non-gendered.

Auslan in relation to English
It is sometimes wrongly assumed that English-speaking countries share a single sign language.  Auslan is a natural language distinct from spoken or written English. Its grammar and vocabulary often do not have direct English equivalents and vice versa. However, English, as the dominant language in Australia, has had a significant influence on Auslan, especially through manual forms such as fingerspelling and (more recently) Signed English.

It is difficult to sign Auslan fluently while speaking English, as the word order may be different, and there is often no direct sign-to-word equivalence. However, mouthing of an English word together with a sign may serve to clarify when one sign may have several English equivalents. In some cases, the mouth gesture that accompanies a sign may not reflect the equivalent translation in English (e.g. a sign meaning "thick" may be accompanied by a mouth gesture that does not resemble any English word).

Fingerspelling

A two-handed manual alphabet, identical to the one used in British Sign Language and New Zealand Sign Language, is integral to Auslan. This alphabet is used for fingerspelling proper nouns such as personal or place names, common nouns for everyday objects, and English words, especially technical terms, for which there is no widely used sign. Fingerspelling can also be used for emphasis, clarification, or, sometimes extensively, by English-speaking learners of Auslan. The proportion of fingerspelling versus signs varies with the context and the age of the signer. A recent small-scale study puts fingerspelled words in Auslan conversations at about 10% of all lexical items, roughly equal to ASL and higher than many other sign languages, such as New Zealand Sign Language. The proportion is higher in older signers, suggesting that the use of fingerspelling has diminished over time.

Schembri and Johnston (2007) found that the most commonly fingerspelled words in Auslan include "so", "to", "if", "but" and "do".

Some signs also feature an English word's initial letter as a handshape from a one- or two-handed manual alphabet and use it within a sign. For example, part of the sign for "Canberra" incorporates the letter "C".

Signed English

Australasian Signed English was created in the late 1970s to represent English words and grammar, using mostly Auslan signs together with some additional contrived signs, as well as borrowings from American Sign Language (ASL). It was used largely in education for teaching English to Deaf children or for discussing English in academic contexts, and it is not clear to what extent this continues to be the case. It was thought to be much easier for hearing teachers and parents to learn another mode of English than to learn a new language with a complex spatial grammar such as Auslan.

The use of Signed English in schools is controversial with some in the Deaf community, who regard Signed English as a contrived and unnatural artificially constructed language. Signed English has now been largely rejected by Deaf communities in Australia and its use in education is dwindling; however, a number of its signs have made their way into normal use.

Acquisition and nativeness
Unlike oral languages, only a minority of Deaf children acquire their language from their parents (about 4 or 5% have Deaf parents). Most acquire Auslan from Deaf peers at school or later through Deaf community networks. Many learn Auslan as a "delayed" first language in adolescence or adulthood, after attempting to learn English (or another spoken/written language) without the exposure necessary to properly acquire it. The Deaf community often distinguish between "oral deaf" who grew up in an oral or signed English educational environment without Auslan, and those "Deaf Deaf" who learnt Auslan at an early age from Deaf parents or at a Deaf school. Regardless of their background, many Deaf adults consider Auslan to be their first or primary language, and see themselves as users of English as a second language.

Variation and standardisation
Auslan exhibits a high degree of variation, determined by the signer's age, educational background, and regional origin, and the signing community is very accepting of a wide range of individual differences in signing style.

There is no standard dialect of Auslan. Standard dialects arise through the support of institutions, such as the media, education, government and the law. As this support has not existed for most sign languages, coupled with the lack of a widely used written form and communications technologies, Auslan has probably diverged much more rapidly from BSL than Australian English has from British English.

Auslan was introduced to Papua New Guinea, where it mixed with local or home sign and Tok Pisin to produce Papua New Guinean Sign Language. Sign languages related to Auslan also appear to be used in some other parts of the Asia-Pacific, such as in Fiji.

Dialects
Linguists often regard Auslan as having two major dialects—Northern (Queensland and New South Wales), and Southern (Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, and Western Australia). The vocabulary of the two dialects traditionally differed significantly, with different signs used even for very common concepts such as colours, animals, and days of the week; differences in grammar appear to be slight.

These two dialects may have roots in older dialectal differences from the United Kingdom, brought over by Deaf immigrants who founded the first schools for the Deaf in Australia — varieties from the southeast of England in Melbourne and Scottish varieties  in Sydney, although the relationship between lexical variation in the UK and Australia appears much more complicated than this (some Auslan signs appear similar to signs used in a range of regional varieties of BSL). Before schools were established elsewhere, Deaf children attended one of these two initial schools, and brought signs back to their own states. As schools opened up in each state, new signs also developed in the dormitories and playgrounds of these institutions. As a result, Auslan users can identify more precise regional varieties (e.g., "Sydney sign", "Melbourne sign", "Perth sign", "Adelaide sign" and "Brisbane sign"), and even vocabulary that may have been unique to individual schools. In a conversation between two strangers, one from Melbourne and the other from Perth, it is likely that one will use a small number of signs unfamiliar to the other, despite both belonging to the same "southern dialect". Signers can often identify which school someone went to, even within a few short utterances.

Despite these differences, communication between Auslan users from different regions poses little difficulty for most Deaf Australians, who often become aware of different regional vocabulary as they grow older, through travel and Deaf community networks, and because Deaf people are so well practised in bridging barriers to communication.

Indigenous Australian sign languages and Auslan

A number of Indigenous Australian sign languages exist, unrelated to Auslan, such as Warlpiri Sign Language and Yolngu Sign Language. They occur in the southern, central, and western desert regions, coastal Arnhem Land, some islands of the north coast, the western side of Cape York Peninsula, and on some Torres Strait Islands. They have also been noted as far south as the Murray River.

Deaf Indigenous people of Far North Queensland (extending from Yarrabah to Cape York) form a distinct signing community using a dialect of Auslan; it has features of Indigenous sign languages and gestural systems as well as signs and grammar of Auslan.

Written and recorded Auslan
Auslan has no written form; in the past transcribing Auslan was largely an academic exercise. The first Auslan dictionaries used either photographs or drawings with motion arrows to describe signs; more recently,  technology has made possible the use of short video clips on CD-ROM or online dictionaries.

SignWriting, however, has its adherents in Australia.

A Silent Agreement was Australia's first theatrically released feature film to showcase Australian Sign Language in its main dialogue and as a plot element, with some scenes depicted entirely in Auslan. There is also one scene where the characters discuss the risky politics of using non-deaf actors using sign language in film.

See also
 List of sign languages

References

Other references

Further reading
 Johnston, T. & Schembri, A. (2007). Australian Sign Language (Auslan): An introduction to sign language linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. .
 Johnston, T.A. & Wilkin, P. (1998; reprinted 2010, see Deaf Australia : Auslan Shop .) Signs of Australia : A new dictionary of Auslan (the sign language of the Australian Deaf community). North Rocks, NSW, Australia : North Rocks Press : Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children.

External links

 www.auslan.org.au - An online dictionary of Auslan video clips
 ASLIA - Australian Sign Language Interpreters Association
 Auslan online dictionaries
 The Endangered Languages Archive of Auslan recordings

BANZSL Sign Language family
Sign languages of Australia

Auslan


Arkansas Valley Electric Cooperative Corporation is a not-for-profit Corporation headquartered in Ozark, AR. District offices are located in Waldron and Van Buren, AR. and Pocola, OK.

The Cooperative was organized in 1937 by a group of farmers and businessmen from Crawford, Logan and Johnson Counties in west-central Arkansas. It has since expanded to ten counties in Arkansas and three in Oklahoma.

The first 57 miles of power line were energized in December 1938 to provide electric service to 114 meters. The average member had a monthly electric bill of $3.00 and used approximately 30 kWh (kilowatt hours).

The Cooperative purchased nearly 1.2 billion kilowatt hours of electricity during 2009. The system peak demand of 327 Megawatts (million watts) was set in July 2011. The Cooperative purchases its power wholesale from Arkansas Electric Cooperatives Corporation, Little Rock, AR.

Currently the Cooperative has more than 8,100 miles of distribution lines, 33 electrical substations, and more than 56,000 electric services. The total electric plant of AVECC is valued at $173 million and member equity is 31%.

External links
 Arkansas Valley Electric Cooperative Corporation

Companies based in Arkansas
Electric cooperatives in Arkansas
Electric cooperatives in Oklahoma
1937 establishments in Arkansas
Organizations established in 1937

Arkansas Valley Electric Cooperative


Football Club Sochaux-Montbéliard (; commonly referred to as FCSM or simply Sochaux) is a French association football club based in the city of Montbéliard. The club was founded in 1928 and currently plays in Championnat National, the third tier of French football, after having been administratively relegated from Ligue 2 in the 2022–23 season, despite a 9th place finish. Sochaux plays its home matches at the Stade Auguste Bonal, located within the city.

Sochaux was founded by Jean-Pierre Peugeot, a prominent member of the Peugeot family, and is one of the founding members of the first division of French football. The club has won both Ligue 1 and the Coupe de France twice and have also won the Coupe de la Ligue. Sochaux's last honour came in 2007 when the club, under the guidance of Alain Perrin, defeated favourites Marseille 5–4 on penalties in the 2007 Coupe de France Final. Sochaux's colours are gold and navy blue.

Sochaux is known for its youth academy, which has regularly finished in the top ten rankings of youth academies in France (fourth in 2010). The most successful team in the academy is the under-19 team, which has won the Coupe Gambardella twice, in 1973 and 2007. In 2010, Sochaux finished runners-up to Metz in the 2010 edition of the competition. The academy has produced several notable talents, such as Yannick Stopyra, El-Hadji Diouf, Jérémy Ménez, Bernard Genghini and Benoît Pedretti, among others. The club were a regular in the top flight, until relegation in 2014.

History
Football Club Sochaux-Montbéliard was founded in 1928 under the name Football Club Sochaux by Jean-Pierre Peugeot, a director of Peugeot, a French car manufacturing company. Peugeot sought to create a football club for the leisure time of the company's workers. He installed Louis Maillard-Salin as the club's first president, and made Maurice Bailly the club's first manager. Bailly was also a member of the team. Sochaux played its first match on 2 September 1928 against the reserve team of local club AS Montbéliard. The club was inserted into the lowest level of league football in the Franche-Comté region and played its first league match three weeks later winning 12–1.

Peugeot was among the first to advocate for the professionalisation of French football and, in 1929, went as far as to admit to paying his players, which was strictly forbidden during this time. The subsequent recruitment of several French internationals and players from abroad led to Sochaux gaining a stranglehold on the region easily disposing of local rivals AS Montbéliard and AS Valentigney. In June 1930, Montbéliard decided to merge with Sochaux to form the club that exists today. The following month, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. With Peugeot being a strong advocate for professionalism, Sochaux were among the first clubs to adopt the new statute and, subsequently, became professional. In the league's inaugural season, Sochaux finished 3rd in its group. The club's final position was later moved to 2nd after Antibes, the champions of the group, was disqualified from the league for suspected bribery.

In the 1934–35 season, Sochaux captured its first league title finishing one point ahead of Strasbourg. Led by Uruguayan manager Conrad Ross, as well as captain Étienne Mattler, known as Le Lion de Belfort, and strikers Roger Courtois and Bernard Williams, Sochaux dominated the league losing only four times. Two seasons later, the same team, with the addition of goalkeeper Laurent Di Lorto and the Swiss duo of André Abegglen and Maxime Lehmann, Sochaux won its first Coupe de France title. The club faced league rivals Strasbourg in the final and defeated the Alsatians 2–1 courtesy of goals from Williams and the Argentine Miguel Angel Lauri. Ross finished his career at Sochaux by winning another league title in 1938. After the 1938–39 season, Ross and several players departed the club to play and manage abroad due to the onset of World War II. The non-deserters were, subsequently, called into action to fight with the French Army, which ultimately caused the club to limit its aspiring ambitions.

During war-time, in an effort to survive financially, Sochaux formed an interim merger with local rivals AS Valentigney. The club, known as FC Sochaux-Valentigney, participated in the war-time championships from 1942 to 1944. Following the conclusion of the war, Sochaux dissolved the merger, turn professional again, and returned to its original name. The club, however, failed to get back to its form prior to the war and, subsequently, made the decision to forgo entering bidding wars for players, which was becoming the norm and, instead, focus on keeping the team's budget even. As a result, in the first season after the war, Sochaux suffered relegation after finishing in last place with only 15 points. Sochaux spent only one season in the second division and returned to Division 1 for the 1947–48 season. The club spent the next 13 seasons playing in Division 1 with its best finish coming during the 1952–53 season when the club finished runner-up to champions Stade Reims. In the same season, Sochaux won its first honour since 1938 after winning the Coupe Charles Drago. In 1959, the club returned to the Coupe de France final, however, the outcome was not in Sochaux's favour, with the club losing 3–0 to Le Havre in a replay after a 2–2 draw.

In the early 1960s, despite playing in Division 2, Sochaux won the Coupe Drago in back-to-back seasons. The club made its return to Division 1 in 1964, and remained in the league for over 20 years, regularly finishing in the top ten before falling down to Division 2 in the 1987–88 season. During Sochaux's 24-year run in the first division, the club played in European competitions four times. In the 1980–81 season, Sochaux surprised many by reaching the semi-finals of the UEFA Cup. In the round, the club was defeated by Dutch club AZ 4–3 on aggregate. The club's successful play during this stint was predominantly due to the creation of the club's academy in 1974, which paid immediate dividends. Player such as Bernard Genghini, Yannick Stopyra, Joël Bats and Philippe Anziani were among the inaugural graduates who were instrumental in Sochaux's domestic success.

After hovering between the first division and the second division in the 1990s, Sochaux returned to the first division, now called Ligue 1, at the start of the new millennium. The club surprised many by finishing in the top ten in its first three seasons back. Also included in that three-year run was an appearance in the Coupe de la Ligue final and, in the ensuing year, a league cup title. In the 2003 final, Sochaux, led by manager Guy Lacombe and academy graduates Pierre-Alain Frau, Jérémy Mathieu, and Benoît Pedretti, were defeated 4–1 by Monaco. In the following season, a more experienced Sochaux returned to the final, where the club faced Nantes. Sochaux defeated Nantes 5–4 on penalties to win its first major title since winning the Coupe Drago 40 years previously. It did not take the club another 40 years to claim its next title as Sochaux were surprise winners of the Coupe de France in the 2006–07 season after defeating Marseille on penalties. Marseille were heavy favourites heading into match, mainly due to its 4–2 thrashing of Sochaux just 12 days before. However, Sochaux, led by Alain Perrin, stunned the nation and claimed its first Coupe de France title since 1937.

In July 2015, Peugeot sold the team to Hong Kong company Ledus. In 2018 it was announced that Spanish club Alavés (whose owners had a stake in Ledus) was starting a partnership with Sochaux; however the agreement lasted only a few months, ending abruptly in December of the same year.

With Omar Daf as coach, FCSM win the last game of season against Grenoble Foot 38 and save his Ligue 2 place. Club finish 16th in Ligue 2 but is demoted to National by the DNCG (National Directorate of Management Control), for not having presented balanced accounts.

Chinese real estate group Nenking, who unofficially take the reins of the club, following the economic problems encountered by Tech Pro, inject money into the coffers to save him from relegation. Nenking also appoint Samuel Laurent to the position of general director.

In April 2020, the Football Club Sochaux-Montbéliard SASP (Société Anonyme Sportive Professionnelle) officially became the property of the Nenking Group. "This sale to the group whose founding president is Mr. Zhong Naixiong comes in accordance with the agreements previously made with Ledus"  and Frankie Yau become president.

On 28 June 2023, the DNCG confirmed the administrative relegation of Sochaux to Championnat National due to their financial crisis.

Stadium

Sochaux plays its home matches at the Stade Auguste Bonal in Montbéliard. The stadium was constructed in 1931 and opened on 11 November of that same year. The facility was previously known as Stade de la Forge. In July 1945, the club changed the stadium's name to its current version. It is named after Auguste Bonal, the former sports director of the club, who after refusing to co-operate with the Germans during World War II, was murdered.

The Stade Auguste Bonal has undergone renovations twice: in 1973 and 1997. In 1997, the majority of the stadium was completely overhauled, and practically a new stadium was built. The stadium still hosted matches during the renovation period, but with a limited capacity. The renovation cost ₣114 million, and took nearly three years to complete. The Nouveau Bonal was officially inaugurated on 22 July 2000 in a Trophée des champions match between FC Nantes and AS Monaco. The stadium's current capacity is 20,005.

Honors and Records

Honors
The following table lists the honors of FC Sochaux-Montbéliard, updated as of January 1, 2010, in various official competitions at the national and international levels, as well as in youth competitions. In friendly tournaments, the club won the Coupe Peugeot in 1931 and was a finalist in the Trophée Joan Gamper in 1989.

National Records

 Largest victory: 12-1, on August 25, 1935, against Valenciennes
 Youngest player to achieve a hat-trick: Jérémy Ménez, on  against Bordeaux at 17 years 8 months and 15 days

Club Records

 Most consecutive seasons in Ligue 2: 9 (2014–2023)
 Largest home victory: 12-1, Sochaux vs. Valenciennes, 1935/1936
 Largest away victory: 1-7, Lyon vs. Sochaux, 1987/1988
 Largest home defeat: 0-5, Sochaux vs. Monaco, 1994/19951-6, Sochaux vs. Ajaccio, 2017/2018
 Largest away defeat: 8-0, RC Paris vs. Sochaux, 1959/1960
 Most appearances (all competitions): Albert Rust (454 matches)
 Most goals scored (all competitions): Roger Courtois (281 goals)
 Youngest player in an official match: Eliezer Mayenda (16 years, 7 months, and 10 days).

Players

Current squad

Out on loan

Notable former players
Below are the notable former players who have represented Sochaux in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1928. To appear in the section below, a player must have played in at least 200 official matches for the club.

For a complete list of Sochaux players, see :Category:FC Sochaux-Montbéliard players

 Cedric Bakambu
 Philippe Anziani
 Eugène Battmann
 Olivier Baudry
 Mehmed Baždarević
 Éric Benoît
 Serge Bourdoncle
 Roger Courtois
 Laurent Croci
 Omar Daf
 Abdel Djaadaoui
 Thierry Fernier
 Maxence Flachez
 Pierre-Alain Frau
 René Gardien
 Bernard Genghini
 Faruk Hadžibegić
 Fabrice Henry
 Michaël Isabey
 Zvonko Ivezić
 Pierre Lechantre
 Philippe Lucas
 Erwan Manac'h
 Bernard Maraval
 Jérémy Mathieu
 Vojislav Melić
 Jérémy Ménez
 Miranda
 Stéphane Paille
 Benoît Pedretti
 Ivan Perisic
 Romain Pitau
 Jean-Pierre Posca
 Claude Quittet
 Albert Rust
 Jean-Luc Ruty
 Adolphe Schmit
 Laszlo Seleš
 Franck Silvestre
 Yannick Stopyra
 Joseph Tellechéa
 Jean-Christophe Thomas
 Marcel Wassmer
 Jaouad Zairi

Honours

Domestic
Ligue 1
Champions: 1934–35, 1937–38
Ligue 2
Champions: 1946–47, 1987–88 , 2000–01
Coupe de France
Champions: 1936–37, 2006–07
Runners-up: 1958–59, 1966–67, 1987–88
Coupe de la Ligue
Champions: 2003–04
Runners-up: 2002–03
Trophée des Champions
Runners-up: 2007
Coupe Gambardella
Champions: 1983, 2007, 2015
Runners-up: 1975, 2010

Other
Coupe Charles Drago
Champions (3): 1953, 1963, 1964
Coupe Peugeot
Champions (1): 1931
Coupe Mohamed V
Champions (1): 1989
Joan Gamper Trophy
Runners-up (1): 1989

Management and staff
Senior club staff
President: Frédéric Dong Bo

Coaching staff
Manager: Olivier Guégan
Assistant coaches: Ali Boumnijel and Stéphane Mangione
Goalkeeping coach: Gérard Gnanhouan

Managerial history

See also
Works team

References

External links

Montbéliard
Association football clubs established in 1928
1928 establishments in France
Sport in Doubs
Peugeot
Sochaux-Montbéliard
Football clubs in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Ligue 1 clubs

FC Sochaux-Montbéliard


Fatma Boussaha () (born January 22 1942 in Zaghouan - died October 27 2015) was a Tunisian Mezwed singer. Fatma Boussaha performed several titles like Ya ami echiffour (Hey my uncle the driver) and Ya karhebt Kamel (Hey the car of Kamel). She was known for her song Achchibani wassa (Laisse passer le Vieuxard) in 1999. Her last title, Trabek ghali ya touness, (Your dust is precious, Tunis) dates from 2012.  At one time, she was banned from broadcasting on Tunisian television as were other mezoued artists. Boussaha died on Tuesday October 27, 2015 at her home.

At the end of her life, touched by cancer, she found herself alone facing her fight, leading the Ministry of Culture to take charge of her care within the framework of her program of assistance to artists.

References

Other websites

2015 deaths
1942 births
Singers from Tunis

Fatma Boussaha


Cent briques et des tuiles is a 1965 French film directed by Pierre Grimblat.

Synopsis

Marcel, a small-time gangster, has lost all his gang's proceeds, 20 million francs, while gambling. His accomplices, the Shultz brothers, throw him out of his apartment and give him a week to come up with the money. Marcel goes to Champs Elysées, there crossing paths with his old friend Étienne, who proposes a robbery of the Galeries Lafayette store, telling Marcel it should net them 100 million francs. Étienne and Marcel (possibly a reference to Étienne Marcel) join forces with Justin, who disguises himself as Santa Claus. With the aid of the shop's lift boy, the heist is a success, but the banknotes are soaked in water, setting off the gang's troubles.

A group of young street criminals unsuccessfully trying to rob a neighbourhood shop run into Justin and take the money. At the end of a chain of bizarre events, Marcel's gang takes the money from the young criminals after the latter have a car accident. However, they're faced with a new problem: separating the bills which have dried up and stuck together like bricks. The gang tries to solve the problem by boiling them and drying again.

Cast
 Jean-Claude Brialy as Marcel
 Marie Laforêt as Ida
 Sophie Daumier as Moune
 Jean-Pierre Marielle as Justin
 Michel Serrault as Méloune
 Albert Rémy as Etienne
 Pierre Clémenti as Raf
 Daniel Ceccaldi as Léon
 Robert Manuel as Palmoni
 Dominique Davray as Poulaine
 Renaud Verley as Charles
 Bernard Fresson as Policeman
 Paul Préboist as The Cousin

External links

1965 films
1960s French-language films
French heist films
1960s heist films
1960s French films

Cent briques et des tuiles