University of Alabama

The University of Alabama (Alabama or UA) is a public research university located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States, and the flagship of the University of Alabama System. Founded in 1831, UA is one of the oldest and the largest of the universities in Alabama. UA offers programs of study in 13 academic divisions leading to bachelor's, master's, Education Specialist, and doctoral degrees. The only publicly supported law school in the state is at UA. Other academic programs unavailable elsewhere in Alabama include doctoral programs in anthropology, communication and information sciences, metallurgical engineering, music, Romance languages, and social work.

As one of the first public universities established in the early 19th century southwestern frontier of the United States, the University of Alabama has left a vast cultural imprint on the state, region and nation over the past two centuries. The school was a center of activity during the American Civil War and the African-American Civil Rights Movement. The University of Alabama varsity football program (nicknamed the Crimson Tide), which was inaugurated in 1892, ranks as one of 10 winningest programs in US history. In a 1913 speech then-president George H. Denny extolled the university as the "capstone of the public school system in the state [of Alabama]," lending the university its current nickname, The Capstone. The University of Alabama has consistently been ranked as one of the top 50 public universities in the nation by the U.S. News & World Report. The University of Alabama is consistently recognized as having one of the most beautiful college campuses in America.

Alabama

Alabama (ⁱ/ˌæləˈbæmə/) is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama is the 30th-most extensive and the 24th-most populous of the 50 United States. At 1,300 miles (2,100 km), Alabama has one of the longest navigable inland waterways in the nation.

From the American Civil War until World War II, Alabama, like many states in the South, suffered economic hardship, in part because of continued dependence on agriculture. Despite the growth of major industries and urban centers, White rural interests dominated the state legislature from 1901 to the 1960s, as it did not regularly reapportion the legislature from 1901 to 1961; urban interests and African Americans were markedly under-represented. African Americans and poor whites were essentially disenfranchised altogether by the state constitution of 1901, a status that continued into the mid-1960s before being alleviated by federal legislation. Exclusion of minorities continued under at-large voting systems in most counties; some changes were made through a series of omnibus court cases in the late 1980s to establish different electoral systems.

University

A university (Latin: universitas, "a whole") is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which grants academic degrees in various subjects and typically provides undergraduate education and postgraduate education. The word "university" is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars."

History

Definition

The original Latin word "universitas" refers in general to "a number of persons associated into one body, a society, company, community, guild, corporation, etc." At the time of the emergence of urban town life and medieval guilds, specialised "associations of students and teachers with collective legal rights usually guaranteed by charters issued by princes, prelates, or the towns in which they were located" came to be denominated by this general term. Like other guilds, they were self-regulating and determined the qualifications of their members.

In modern usage the word has come to mean "An institution of higher education offering tuition in mainly non-vocational subjects and typically having the power to confer degrees," with the earlier emphasis on its corporate organization considered as applying historically to Medieval universities.

Roll Tide

Roll Tide is the rallying cry for the Alabama Crimson Tide athletic teams. The trademark to the phrase is claimed by the University of Alabama, with licensing and marketing by The Collegiate Licensing Company.

Music

"Roll Tide" is also the name of a dramatic piece of orchestral music that was composed by Hans Zimmer for the 1995 Hollywood Pictures film Crimson Tide. Most of film's setting is aboard the USS Alabama, an Ohio-class nuclear-powered fleet ballistic missile submarine.

References

External links

USS Alabama

At least seven United States Navy ships have been named Alabama, after the southern state of Alabama.