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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Which is the second factor that Mencken identifies as an impediment to the growth of the American language in Chapter 3.1?

2. According to Benjamin Franklin, what was roughly the population of the colonies in 1751?

3. What is the English meaning of the phrase "to carry on"?

4. What does John S. Farmer describe the Western vernacular as being?

5. What term did John Witherspoon coin, framing it within the context of vulgarity?

Short Essay Questions

1. What general problem of language does Mencken describe in Chapter 1.1?

2. Under what situation does language undergo great changes and renew its vitality, according to Mencken in Chapter 9.1?

3. How is the advance of American spelling characterized in Chapter 8.3?

4. To what does Mencken ascribe the withdrawal of the National Education Association from the simplified spelling campaign?

5. What is revealed by the attitudes of the English conservatives in Australia towards American spelling?

6. In what way did the early political disunity of the United States hamper the growth of a national language, according to Mencken in Chapter 3.1?

7. What is Mencken's evident attitude towards the "wearing down" of vowel and consonant sounds in the vulgar American pronunciation?

8. Characterize the intentions and effects of the renaming done by the Geographical Board, according to Mencken.

9. What is the character of the argument presented by the Society for Pure English in the quoted caveat?

10. Who does Grandgent say are under the influence of the British in terms of their pronunciation?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Through what Mencken claims concerning the nature of slang, in Chapter 11, it could be construed as a microcosm of The American Language as a whole. Write an essay investigating this claim. What are the chief characteristics of any linguistic development? What are the chief characteristics of the development of slang? How are they alike? How are they different? What processes do they undergo? What is significant and mutually relevant in these processes?

Essay Topic 2

Unlike nouns and adjectives, Mencken devotes considerable inquiry to the nature and alteration of verb forms in The American Language. Write an essay explaining the attention that Mencken pays to verbs. What role do they fulfill in communication? Why do its particular forms change more rapidly than other parts of speech? What does this rapid changing indicate about the relationship between language and circumstance/culture? How do verbs typically change? What is significant about the manner in which they typically change?

Essay Topic 3

Compose an essay analyzing the Americanization of foreign names, as presented in The American Language. How are they Americanized? What characterizes the Americanization of surnames? What characterizes the Americanization of given names? What influences their Americanization? Why are they Americanized? What is lost by their Americanization? What is the result of this tendency to conformity?

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