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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. What planet had to appear in the sky on a Friday evening in order to cast a love spell?

2. What place did Mina come from?

3. What kind of bird did Chama and Mernissi's mother embroider on Chama's red silk qamis?

4. What was the tradition that Mernissi's mother followed after her beauty treatments were finished?

5. Whose words are the last to be spoken in the book?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why did the women of the harem attend Sidi Belal's possession dance in secret?

2. What was Mernissi's father's attitude about her mother's beauty rituals?

3. Why was Mernissi's mother not allowed to go to literacy classes?

4. What does Mernissi say were the two things a woman had to do to capture a man's love?

5. Why was Samir thrown out of the women's hamman?

6. Why did Mernissi like to hide in olive jars?

7. Why did Aunt Habiba visit the forbidden terrace?

8. How did Mernissi's mother tame her daughter's unruly hair?

9. How did Mina survive being put down a well by her kidnappers as a young child?

10. What did the grownups think that children should know about violence?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the progress in women's rights that Mernissi witnessed during her childhood. Why did Chama think that her generation of women were being sacrificed? What change regarding dress did Mernissi's mother put into effect that changed her life for the better?

Essay Topic 2

Compare the quality of life for women in the harems in Fez and on Grandfather Tazi's farm. Who seemed to have more freedom?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss how Mernissi's life changed once institutions for educating girls were approved. What did she like about the nationalist school she transferred to? How did going to this school improve her life?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 792 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample