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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How is "Des Moines" pronounced in American, according to Mencken?
(a) "Dei-moyns."
(b) "Dai-moins."
(c) "Dess-moyn."
(d) "Dee-moyns."

2. Which reporter first brings colloquial Americanisms to the written word, according to Mencken in Chapter 9.2?
(a) George Ade.
(b) Ring W. Lardner.
(c) Josh Billings.
(d) J.C. Neal.

3. Which 1914 English dictionary made many important concessions to American spellings?
(a) The Concise Oxford Dictionary.
(b) The London Pocket Dictionary.
(c) The Cambridge Fleet Edition.
(d) The New English Dictionary.

4. Who is apparently the first literary critic to point out the "enormous gap between the literate and unliterate American"?
(a) Rene Wellek.
(b) Allen Tate.
(c) Francis Hackett.
(d) I.A. Richards.

5. Which of the following is the analogate to which Mencken compares the slang words overused by the ignorant?
(a) Coins.
(b) Marriages.
(c) Cushions.
(d) Horses.

6. According to Dr. Louise Pound, what do Latin plurals tend to become in colloquial American?
(a) Adverbs.
(b) Adjectival modifiers.
(c) Infinitive verbs.
(d) Singular nouns.

7. What was the Anglo-Saxon form of the modern-day word "my," according to Mencken in Chapter 9.4?
(a) Mine.
(b) Mi.
(c) Min.
(d) Mien.

8. What does Mencken say, in colloquial American, has obliterated the verb?
(a) Over-regulation.
(b) Illiteracy.
(c) Vulgar speech.
(d) The auxiliary.

9. Which still-popular German given name survives today, with a slight change in spelling, as Mencken reports in Chapter 10.2?
(a) Karl.
(b) Wilhelm.
(c) Hans.
(d) Franz.

10. In what dialect of English is "slick" used synonymously with "sleek" according to Chapter 9.10?
(a) English.
(b) Australian.
(c) South African.
(d) American.

11. Which adjectival prefix does Mencken state is confined to the more sophisticated classes?
(a) Ultra-.
(b) Super-.
(c) Ante-.
(d) Pen-.

12. According to the study of E.J. Hills, how many descriptive adjectives are possessed by the average child of two?
(a) 72.
(b) 59.
(c) 23.
(d) 173.

13. In what location does Mencken say both the American and English orthographies flourish side by side?
(a) New England.
(b) Canada.
(c) Hong Kong.
(d) Australia.

14. According to the "Vocabulary of the A.E.F.," what percentage of the American military vocabulary was at least somewhat indecent?
(a) 50%.
(b) 12%.
(c) 25%.
(d) 8%.

15. Which of the following does names, used for a settlement, Mencken not list as bespattering the land?
(a) Lafayette.
(b) Jefferson.
(c) Madison.
(d) Washington.

Short Answer Questions

1. In what year did Noah Webster die?

2. To what does Mencken ascribe the inflection of English adjectives?

3. What sort of distinction frequently occurs between an adverb and its primary adjective?

4. Which organization produced a prospectus in 1913 that warned against extreme English conservatism in the spelling of foreign loan-words?

5. Who does Mencken quote as saying, "There is no part of the world where nomenclature is so rich, poetical, humorous and picturesque as in the United States of America"?

(see the answer keys)

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