View a FREE sample

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

Short Answer Questions

1. In what month and year did Zora Neale Hurston first meet Cudjo?

2. What body of water borders the land on which the barracoons housing Cudjo and other slaves stood?

3. What does Cudjo say had been his father's name?

4. Hearing what word often brings tears to Cudjo's eyes within the interviews?

5. How many fully biologically-related older siblings had Cudjo had?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Cudjo's reaction when Hurston calls him Kossula?

2. After Cudjo tells Hurston about his grandfather, what happens to make Hurston cut their visit short for the day?

3. At what age does Cudjo describe leaving Africa, and what does he say about the number of initiation rites he had completed by that time?

4. What are the circumstances of Zora Neale Hurston first meeting with Cudjo?

5. In the Preface, Hurston states her reasons for faithfully representing Cudjo's story "without the intrusion of interpretation" (3). What does she mean?

6. What does Cudjo mean when he tells Hurston that his family "ain' got no ivory be de door" (19)?

7. Cudjo discusses a particular practice undertaken by rich men's daughters in his former community in Africa. What is that practice he describes?

8. How does Hurston distinguish between the two types of gifts she brings to Cudjo at the start of Chapter IV and why does she make this distinction?

9. What is the significance of the year 1859 in Cudjo's life?

10. What is the custom Cudjo describes that involves the whiskers of a leopard?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How does Hurston's use of the third person point of view serve her purposes over the course of the book? Discuss how Hurston’s choice of point of view at certain points within the text helps to advance her treatment of at least three particular themes within the text.

Essay Topic 2

Examine Cudjo’s use of characterization methods to portray his family members and other people whom he discusses with Zora Neale Hurston. What effect do these characterization methods have on the work's inherent themes and messages?

Essay Topic 3

How does the theme of deception arise within the text of Hurston's book Barracoon and what messages are sent about the presence of deception within the human condition?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,112 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample