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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Morrison claim has impoverished literature?
(a) Anger at Eurocentric culture.
(b) New readers.
(c) Agendas in criticism.
(d) Critics of American literature.

2. What does Morrison consider the consequences of?
(a) Literary whiteness and blackness.
(b) Literary feminism.
(c) Exemplary black and white characters.
(d) Racial profiling in literature.

3. What is assumed about literature much of the time, in Morrison's point of view?
(a) American literature is unshaped by black presence.
(b) American literature is unshaped by slavery.
(c) American literature is only read by Americans.
(d) American literature is worthless for black Americans.

4. Who does Sapphira plot to rape her slave?
(a) Her nephew.
(b) Her brother.
(c) Her son.
(d) Her husband.

5. What does Morrison debate the validity of?
(a) American literature is unbiased.
(b) American literature is light with no undertones.
(c) American literature is free form.
(d) American literature is only about Americans.

6. Where does Morrison claim to apply the knowledge in Playing in the Dark?
(a) The way she argues.
(b) The class she teaches.
(c) The way she reads.
(d) The way she communicates.

7. What are references to Sapphira and the Slave Girl noted as being?
(a) Lackluster.
(b) Apologetic.
(c) Demeaning.
(d) Spiteful.

8. According to Morrison, what does Willa Cather not allow readers to ignore?
(a) Time period.
(b) Setting.
(c) Race.
(d) Class.

9. In Morrison's point of view, what does the fabrication of an Africanist presence a reflexive mediation on?
(a) Readers.
(b) Writers.
(c) Society.
(d) The self.

10. What put the author of The Words to Say It into a gripped panic?
(a) Louis Armstrong concert.
(b) Studying Africanist literature.
(c) Reading a book by Morrison.
(d) Reading Hemingway.

11. What notion must a writer be aware of when reading and writing?
(a) Prejudice.
(b) Anger.
(c) Risk.
(d) Racism.

12. What does The Words to Say It document about the author?
(a) The author's literary criticism of literature.
(b) The author's therapy and healing.
(c) The author's feelings about Africanist literature.
(d) The author's relationship.

13. Which of the following does Morrison acknowledge?
(a) That each author is biased.
(b) That each reader is looking for something different.
(c) That each reader reads differently.
(d) That each writer tries to avoid writing about race.

14. Who gave the lectures that Morrison bases Playing in the Dark on?
(a) Willard Mast.
(b) Wexley Moth.
(c) Westley Morford.
(d) William Massey.

15. How many lectures is Playing in the Dark based on?
(a) 3.
(b) 5.
(c) 1.
(d) 7.

Short Answer Questions

1. Which of the following words does Morrison use to describe writers?

2. Morrison says that what item reveals itself differently to each writer?

3. According to Cardinal, what does America plan to slaughter?

4. When was a criticism written deeming the term "darky" acceptable?

5. Who is the second author Morrison mentions as including black references in his or her work?

(see the answer keys)

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