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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 does Rankine's white male friend send her from the diversity workshop he attends?

2. What James Baldwin poem does Rankine excerpt in Part I?

3. Why did one white friend of Rankine's tell her she had to defend her to her other white friends often?

4. What did the CDC report about breast cancer disparities between white and Black people?

5. What do the people in the workshop say about the scenario comparing a Black person to a monkey?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the tension for Rankine as she expresses it in her poem in Part I in the call to change?

2. What does a white friend of Rankine's tell her about white people speaking amongst themselves about racism?

3. What is one problem Rankine has with the scenario her white friend on a diversity training tells her about regarding a classroom situation?

4. What historical document from the 1700s does Rankine include extensive sections of in Part II?

5. What is one major event in Rankine's life that she discusses in Part II as forcing her to reassess her life as a whole?

6. What does Rankine quote Malcolm X as saying about Black women in America?

7. What is a major reason Rankine decides to go to marriage counseling with her husband?

8. What is the origin of this book's title?

9. What rude and racist behavior does Rankine routinely encounter at airports?

10. What is the name of the class Rankine eventually began teaching and continues to teach at Yale?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How does Rankine feel about, and react to, the idea of "color-blindness" and to people's insistence that they do not "see color"? Write an essay explaining your answers.

Essay Topic 2

What is Rankine's reaction to her white male friend's recounting of a scenario in his diversity training - and his classmates' reaction to the scenario - in which one student in a classroom compares a piece of art depicting a Black person's face to a monkey (61)? Write an essay explaining your answers, citing specific references to the text to help support your conclusions.

Essay Topic 3

At the end of the book, Rankine reveals that she asked a friend to read a draft of the book and the friend told her that the book did not lay out any real "strategy" (334). Do you agree with this critique? Why or why not? Write an essay explaining your answer.

(see the answer keys)

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