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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. Kristeva says Freud echos what German writer when he says "In the beginning was the deed"?

2. Kristeva says that when a child's perfect equilibrium of desire and satisfaction is upset he alternates between fear and what?

3. Freud says "In the beginning was the deed" at the end of which of his books?

4. What state does Freud say a subject will be sent into when the repressed desire for one's mother's body breaks out of its repression?

5. Who does Kristeva say is not directly involved when a child is weaned from his mother's breast?

Short Essay Questions

1. What reason does Kristeva give for why women in the Jewish faith are seen as impure after having children?

2. How does Kristeva say the abject relates to lust?

3. How does Kristeva point out that Judaism differs from other old world religions in terms of worshiping gods?

4. What does Kristeva say is the most plausible interpretation of the laws regarding ritual impurity in the Old Testament?

5. Why does Kristeva say man gained permission to eat some animals?

6. What rules come with the permission to eat meat in the Old Testament?

7. How does Kristeva explain phobias?

8. How does Mary Douglas explain the idea that impurity about the body is a phobia derived from the abject?

9. What two ways of relating to the abject does Kristeva says Dostoevsky presents in "The Possessed"?

10. What example does Kristeva give phobias which involves beautiful women?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Explore the theme of language throughout the book. What does Kristeva seem to think about language and how it can be used? What reason does Kristeva give for why the abject exists outside of language? How can people relate to the abject if not through language? What do you think is the purpose of trying to explain the abject through an essay if it can cannot be felt through words?

Essay Topic 2

Explore Kristeva's use of the concept of sin. How is the concept of sin relevant to the study of the abject? What differences does Kristeva mention in how sin is referred to in the Old Testament and the New Testament? What does she mean when she says sin in the New Testament is a form of "subjectified abjection"?

Essay Topic 3

According to Kristeva's essay, what seems to be the purpose of Celine's use of grotesque and crude imagery? What is he trying to show his readers about their nature and about their identity? How does he use these grotesque images to relate man back to the abject?

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