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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How is the "portmanteau-word" formed?
(a) By blending two words.
(b) By onomatopoeic creativity.
(c) By mixing parts of words with the same meaning in different languages.
(d) By finding the true root in the word.

2. What does the English "secondary school" correspond to in American?
(a) Elementary school.
(b) Middle school.
(c) College.
(d) High school.

3. 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.

4. What is the English meaning of the phrase "to carry on"?
(a) To talk endlessly.
(b) To shoulder one's pack.
(c) To raise hell.
(d) To be on the job.

5. Whose clarity of prevision does Mencken praise in the opening of Chapter 1.1?
(a) Waldo.
(b) Jefferson.
(c) Madison.
(d) Franklin.

6. Who is the author of "Dissertations on the English Language"?
(a) Noah Webster.
(b) Thomas Jefferson.
(c) Benjamin Franklin.
(d) H.L. Mencken.

7. Who proposed a generally accepted nomenclature for currency in 1785?
(a) Noah Webster.
(b) Richard Grant White.
(c) Thomas Jefferson.
(d) Gouverneur Morris.

8. Which London newspaper lamented the "menace" that American movies offer to the purity of the English language?
(a) The <i>Daily Herald</i>.
(b) The <i>Times</i>.
(c) The <i>Illustrated London News</i>.
(d) The <i>Daily News</i>.

9. What letter, when preceding a consonant, greatly irritated Henry James like a "morose grinding of the back teeth?"
(a) R.
(b) E.
(c) T.
(d) G.

10. Who is the author of "Travels in North America," published in 1827?
(a) Louis Untermeyer.
(b) Henry Alford.
(c) Charles Astor Bristed.
(d) Basil Hall.

11. Which letter of the alphabet do Americans differ in pronunciation from other English-speaking countries?
(a) W.
(b) Z.
(c) J.
(d) X.

12. According to Benjamin Franklin, what was roughly the population of the colonies in 1751?
(a) 500,000
(b) 50,000,000
(c) 10,000,000
(d) 1,000,000

13. Which of the early presidents does Mencken identify as archetypal of the new American?
(a) Andrew Jackson.
(b) George Washington.
(c) Thomas Jefferson.
(d) James Monroe.

14. Which of the following was not used as a substitute for the once indecent term, for highly refined ears, "bull"?
(a) Cow-creature.
(b) Gentleman-cow.
(c) Standing-cow.
(d) Male-cow.

15. 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.

Short Answer Questions

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

2. 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?

3. Which Founding Father coined the term "to belittle"?

4. What event does Mencken credit with strengthening the obfuscation of distinction between American and British English?

5. What sound did Webster object to inserting in words such as "gradual" and "nature," before the "u"?

(see the answer keys)

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