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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 9.10.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What class of Americans is most influenced by Briticisms, according to Mencken in Chapter 5.2?
(a) The poor.
(b) The middle-class.
(c) The vulgar.
(d) The fashionable.

2. What purpose does Miss Wittmann say is served by the shortening of word forms?
(a) Color.
(b) Convenience.
(c) None.
(d) Creativity.

3. What country's works dominated the reading habits of the American colonists in the latter 18th century?
(a) England.
(b) France.
(c) Germany.
(d) Denmark.

4. What is the name of the professor who advocates the assimilation and alteration of the spelling and accentuation of foreign words?
(a) Brander Matthews.
(b) Edmund Gosse.
(c) Nora Helmar.
(d) Louise Pound.

5. Which of the following is a term used by philologists to indicate the "instinctive search, etymologically unsound, for short roots in long words"?
(a) Deconstructing.
(b) Formative de-synthesizing.
(c) Etymanalyzing.
(d) Back-formation.

Short Answer Questions

1. In what location does Mencken say both the American and English orthographies flourish side by side?

2. What is the longest list of spelling changes from English to American that Mencken gives in Chapter 8.1?

3. Which letter of the alphabet do Americans differ in pronunciation from other English-speaking countries?

4. Which double negative word is primarily found in Shakespeare?

5. In what parts of language does Mencken say the "chief grammatical peculiarities" of spoken English are found?

(see the answer key)

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