Chad

Coordinates: 15°N 19°E / 15°N 19°E / 15; 19

Chad (ⁱ/tʃæd/; Arabic: تشاد‎ Tshād; French: Tchad), officially the Republic of Chad (Arabic: جمهورية تشاد‎ Jumhūrīyat Tshād; French: République du Tchad), is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic to the south, Cameroon and Nigeria to the southwest and Niger to the west. It is the fifth largest country in Africa in terms of area.

Chad has several regions: a desert zone in the north, an arid Sahelian belt in the centre and a more fertile Sudanian Savanna zone in the south. Lake Chad, after which the country is named, is the largest wetland in Chad and the second-largest in Africa. N'Djamena, the capital, is the largest city. Chad is home to over 200 different ethnic and linguistic groups. Arabic and French are the official languages. Islam and Christianity are the most widely practiced religions.

Beginning in the 7th millennium BC, human populations moved into the Chadian basin in great numbers. By the end of the 1st millennium BC, a series of states and empires rose and fell in Chad's Sahelian strip, each focused on controlling the trans-Saharan trade routes that passed through the region. France conquered the territory by 1920 and incorporated it as part of French Equatorial Africa. In 1960, Chad obtained independence under the leadership of François Tombalbaye. Resentment towards his policies in the Muslim north culminated in the eruption of a long-lasting civil war in 1965. In 1979, the rebels conquered the capital and put an end to the south's hegemony. However, the rebel commanders fought amongst themselves until Hissène Habré defeated his rivals. He was overthrown in 1990 by his general Idriss Déby. Since 2003, the Darfur crisis in Sudan has spilt over the border and destabilised the nation, with hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees living in and around camps in eastern Chad.

Shawn Mendes

Shawn Peter Raul Mendes (born August 8, 1998) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. He attracted a following in 2013, when he began posting song covers on the popular video sharing application Vine. The following year, he caught the attention of artist manager Andrew Gertler and Island Records A&R Ziggy Chareton, which led to him signing a deal with the record label. Mendes went on to release an EP and his debut studio album Handwritten, whose single "Stitches" reached the top 10 in the U.S. and Canada, and number one in the UK.

Early life

Mendes was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and was raised in Pickering, a suburb of the city. He is the son of Karen, a real estate agent, and Manuel Mendes, a businessman, selling bar and restaurant supplies in Toronto. His father is Portuguese (from Algarve), while his mother is English. He attended Pine Ridge Secondary School in Pickering, Ontario.

Career

2014–present: Handwritten

He first started posting cover videos on the popular social video app Vine in 2013 and picked up millions of views and followers in a matter of months, becoming well known for his six-second snippets of renditions of many popular songs. By August 2014, he was the third most-followed musician on Vine. Artist manager Andrew Gertler discovered Mendes online in January 2014, bringing him to Island Records where he eventually signed and released his first single "Life of the Party" in June 2014. He is the youngest artist to debut in the top 25 with a debut song on the Billboard Hot 100, making to number 24 for the week ending July 12, 2014, at 15 years, 11 months and 4 days of age.

Shut Up and Dance

Shut Up and Dance may refer to:

Shut up

"Shut up" is a direct command with a meaning very similar to "be quiet"', but which is commonly perceived as a more forceful command to stop making noise or otherwise communicating, such as talking. The phrase is probably a shortened form of "shut up your mouth" or "shut your mouth up". Its use is generally considered rude and impolite.

Initial meaning and development

Before the twentieth century, the phrase "shut up" was rarely used as an imperative, and had a different meaning altogether. To say that someone was "shut up" meant that they were locked up, quarantined, or held prisoner. For example, several passages in the King James Version of the Bible instruct that if a priest determines that a person shows certain symptoms of illness, "then the priest shall shut up him that hath the plague of the scall seven days". This meaning was also used in the sense of closing something, such as a business, and it is also from this use that the longer phrase "shut up your mouth" likely originated.