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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. How did the author know Tom and Bongani?

2. Why did the author choose not to tell his parents that he had been arrested?

3. How did the author supplement his income during grade 12?

4. How did the author feel about pushing his mother's car?

5. What happened between Maylene and the author on Valentine's Day?

Short Essay Questions

1. How was the author eventually able to make friends at Highlands North?

2. What attribute of the author's aided him in his business fetching lunch for people but also prevented his romantic success?

3. How does the author describe his early thoughts about his victims when he starts a life of crime in the story "The Cheese Boys"?

4. Why did Abel initially agree to loan the author his BMW?

5. Why does the author claim that the "colored people" of modern South Africa are in some ways worse off than the black people of South Africa?

6. What did the author realize when Abel beat up the ringleader from the incident under the mulberry tree?

7. What difference does the author see between German education around the Holocaust and South African education around apartheid?

8. How does the author explain Patricia's ability to buy a house in Highlands North?

9. Why did the author think it made sense for Mayelene to leave him and date Lorenzo instead?

10. How does the author explain the abundance of South Africans with names for controversial historical figures like "Napoleon," "Mussolini," and "Hitler"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

At many different points throughout the collection "Born a Crime," Trevor Noah describes the complications of his racial identity. Write an essay analyzing the role that race played in challenging and facilitating the author's understanding of himself as he grew up.

Essay Topic 2

At many different points throughout the collection "Born a Crime," Trevor Noah describes his family's fluctuating social and economic status. Write an essay analyzing the role that poverty and classism played in challenging and facilitating the author's understanding of himself as he grew up.

Essay Topic 3

According to the collection "Born a Crime," Trevor Noah and his mother, Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah, loved each other deeply, yet argued frequently. Write an essay analyzing the author's descriptions and rhetoric surrounding disagreements between himself and his mother, explaining how the author uses conflict as a device to reveal their emotional bond.

(see the answer keys)

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