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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Which of the following was not a disease that killed large number of peoples in the Americas?
(a) Ringworm
(b) Smallpox
(c) Influenza
(d) Measles

2. What was early writing used for primarily?
(a) Journaling
(b) Accountings of things like sheep and wool
(c) Communicating with other societies
(d) Writing human history

3. Which societies were the most advantaged in Polynesia?
(a) Those with large, native domesticated animals
(b) Those with wild plants that could be domesticated
(c) Those that could hunt large mammals
(d) Those with natural immunity to smallpox

4. What was the biggest difference between the histories of Old World Europe and the New World Americas?
(a) The domestication of large mammals
(b) Denser populations
(c) Sparser populations
(d) More intelligent people

5. Diamond argues that European conquest of Africa had nothing to do with what?
(a) Superior weapons
(b) Accidents of geography
(c) Biogeography
(d) Racial superiority

6. What is a stone tool or implement that an individual used to pound the fibrous bark of some trees into material that could be used for ropes, nets, and clothing?
(a) A hammer
(b) A wood pounder
(c) A tree downer
(d) A bark beater

7. What foods did people in the Americas depend on?
(a) Protein-rich rice
(b) Protein-poor wheat
(c) Protein-poor corn
(d) Protein-rich cows

8. The language that did most of the conquering or "engulfing" in Africa was which of the following?
(a) Bantu
(b) Niger-Congo
(c) Khoisan
(d) Nilo-Saharan

9. When was Diamond's work first published?
(a) 1980
(b) 1987
(c) 1956
(d) 1997

10. Who introduced pottery, chickens, dogs, and pigs to New Guinea?
(a) Indians
(b) Europeans
(c) Austronesians
(d) Native Americans

11. Australia was once joined together what what other land mass?
(a) New Guinea
(b) Cuba
(c) England
(d) Greenland

12. Larger populations created the need for which of the following?
(a) Decentralized food production
(b) A more complex, centralized government
(c) A writing system beyond the alphabet
(d) More nomadic populations who wouldn't compete for resources

13. Where does Diamond believe that more research needs to be done?
(a) How intelligence differences influence development
(b) How cultural differences influence development
(c) How racial differences influence development
(d) How biological differences influence development

14. What does Diamond attribute the differences in development to?
(a) The environment
(b) Culture
(c) Genetics
(d) Intelligence

15. What is necessary for a disease to become an epidemic?
(a) Bad sanitation
(b) A hunter-gatherer society
(c) A small population
(d) A large, sedentary population

Short Answer Questions

1. Chiefdoms disappeared in which century?

2. Governments that distribute wealth from commoners to the upper classes are known as what?

3. What is an discussion that has arisen since Diamond's work was first published?

4. Cultural and individual idiosyncrasies throw what into the course of history?

5. How do inventions spread?

(see the answer keys)

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