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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 a student complains that he is being kept out of law school, what does Rodriguez do?

2. What is the Third World Student Movement?

3. At what stage in their academic career does Rodriguez believe students need help?

4. As an adult, what do people think his complexion says about him?

5. While he writes his book, how does Rodriguez support himself?

Short Essay Questions

1. How would Rodriguez change affirmative action? What examples does he offer to support his suggestion?

2. How does Rodriguez describe his mother's interaction with the public world? Give specific examples.

3. Rodriguez looks at the students of the 1960s and 1970s from a teacher's perspective. What does he see as the difference between them?

4. Now that he is older, how do people respond to Rodriguez's skin color?

5. What does Rodriguez learn from working with the construction workers? Give two specific examples.

6. What does Rodriguez think about the current system of affirmative action? Give two examples he uses to support his argument.

7. What conversation does Rodriguez have with a colleague about teaching positions? What decision does Rodriguez make as a result of that conversation?

8. What does Rodriguez's mother tell him about writing about their family? What does his editor tell him?

9. What kind of social life does Rodriguez have? Does he have lots of friends and girlfriends?

10. What does Rodriguez think about the Civil Rights Movement?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Every book has flat and round characters. A flat character is two-dimensional, someone who serves a purpose in the book but does not seem like a living, breathing person. A round character is one who is fully developed and seems like a real person. If you read a story about a boyfriend and girlfriend eating dinner at a restaurant, the boyfriend and girlfriend will be round characters. The people at the next table or the waiter who serves them their food are probably flat characters.

Part One: Besides Richard Rodriguez, which characters in this book are round? In other words, which ones have fully developed characteristics and identities? Which ones do you feel like you really know? How big a role do these characters play in the book?

Part Two: Which characters are flat or two-dimensional? Do not try to list all of them, but pick out at least four characters that serve an important purpose, but still do not get fully developed. For example, how well developed is the priest who comes to visit? Or the group of black teenagers on the bus?

Part Three: Think as the author for a moment. Why did Rodriguez choose to make some important characters flat? Why did Rodriguez choose to make other important characters round? What does that say about the character or Rodriguez's relationship with the character?

Essay Topic 2

Rodriguez identifies with a student description in a textbook, the "scholarship boy." He feels that is a good representation of how he was as a student.

Part One: Describe the scholarship boy. Identify how that type of student is seen by the teacher, by fellow classmates, and how he sees himself. Identify why Rodriguez related to that description, and use specific examples to support your answer.

Part Two: Write a brief description of the kind of student you are. Identify how that type of student is seen by the teacher, by fellow classmates, and how he/she sees himself/herself. Compare and contrast your description with that of the scholarship boy.

Essay Topic 3

Rodriguez repeatedly describes his experience of moving from a small, sheltered, or narrow world to a larger, less protected, more broad-minded world as he grows up. As he grows up, his views change on:

1) Skin color

2) Religion

3) The importance of language as a way to develop intimacy

4) Books

Choose at least two of those. Identify what Rodriguez's original opinion or idea was, what he later starts to believe, and what events in his life led him to change his perspective.

(see the answer keys)

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