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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. When looking at impurity and the abject, Kristeva says things which extend beyond the body's margin are considered what?

2. What does Kristeva say is, historically, man's primary response to the perversion caused by the abject?

3. What religion does Kristeva say Christianity emerged from?

4. One interpretation of the laws in the Old Testament, which Kristeva cites, says that impurity is identified with contact with whom?

5. Kristeva says the fears a child has are pre-linguistic and therefore are what?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Kristeva say Christianity uses separation and division?

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

3. What does Kristeva say about how the New Testament contradicts the traditional Christian thoughts about the origin of sin?

4. What does it mean when Kristeva says she gives a "phenomenological" account of the abject?

5. Explain Kristeva's idea of the "zero state."

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

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

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

9. How does Kristeva say the impurity phobia serves as a metaphor for society?

10. How do some societies try to purify a "defiled" person?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the concept of the "zero-state" in young children. What does Kristeva mean when she talks about the zero state? What happens when a child starts to come out of the zero state? What are some of the fears and desires that a young, pre-cognitive child might have? How do the fears and desires sync up with Freud's model of the Oedipal triangle? How do they go against it?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss Celine's views on human suffering and Kristeva's interpretation of this. Why did he believe that to be human is to suffer? How does Kristeva relate this sentiment to the abject? How does she then relate suffering to horror? What does she say man is afraid of? How do these feelings unify people?

Essay Topic 3

Explore the concept of the abject. How does Kristeva go about explaining what the abject is? Where does the abject come from? What does Kristeva mean when she says it is neither subject nor object? How does she relate her feelings about the abject to the reader? How does she use her personal experiences with these feelings to explain the abject?

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