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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 3.5 | Chapter 4.1.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Which Founding Father is said to have sought to establish a new American alphabet?
(a) John Hancock.
(b) Thomas Jefferson.
(c) George Washington.
(d) Benjamin Franklin.

2. Which is the first factor that Mencken identifies as an immediate impediment to the growth of the American language in Chapter 3.1?
(a) Lack of a national literature.
(b) Political disharmony.
(c) Regional diversity.
(d) Territorial expansiveness.

3. According to the report of Beverley, what did a group of soldiers turn into after eating some Jimson Weed?
(a) Corpses.
(b) Fools.
(c) Zombies.
(d) Somnambulists.

4. What American writer does Mencken claim likely inspired envy in British writers?
(a) Irving.
(b) Fowler.
(c) Griswold.
(d) Poe.

5. According to the tale spread by William Gifford, what language was supposed to be substituted for English during the Revolutionary War?
(a) Hebrew.
(b) French.
(c) Latin.
(d) Spanish.

Short Answer Questions

1. What word in American is used for the English word "shoe?"

2. To what continent does Mencken attribute the acknowledgment of the differences between American and British English?

3. What "Anglomaniac affectation" did Noah Webster sneer at in 1789?

4. According to Mencken at the beginning of Chapter 1.3, what do the novelists and newspapermen on either side of the Atlantic ocean delight in?

5. According to Mencken, what did the first generations born in the New World value as a virtue over enterprise and resourcefulness?

(see the answer key)

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