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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Part 1, The Seer and the Seen, Section 3.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. According to Ellison what does the term "the grays" mean?
(a) Negro term for white people.
(b) American melting pot.
(c) Negro term for nightfall.
(d) Slang word for feeling bored.

2. What folk tradition does Ellison believe the black face figure grows out of?
(a) Europe.
(b) America.
(c) Africa.
(d) West Indies.

3. Falkner writes exclusively of the southern experience yet Ellison believes him to be addressing what?
(a) Inevitable rise and fall of every civilization.
(b) Effect of war upon culture.
(c) Northern Negro experience.
(d) Nature of man.

4. Hemingway carries on Twain's technical discoveries in writing but loses what?
(a) Twain's humor and light approach to storytelling.
(b) Twain's political and social construct.
(c) Twain's understanding that technique is to be used in the service of truth.
(d) Twain's focus on American subjects.

5. Why does Ellison's family live in a middle class white neighborhood in Oklahoma City?
(a) His mother, a single parent, is a custodian in an apartment building there.
(b) Ellison's father made a great deal of money in the railroad business.
(c) Ellison's family has always been well to do and had nice houses.
(d) There is no Negro neighborhood in Oklahoma City.

Short Answer Questions

1. As a child what do Ellison and his boyhood friends believe they are to do?

2. What does Falkner understand about racial social code of the South?

3. What is the relationship between Ellison and Stanley Hyman?

4. What are the three themes of "Shadow and Act" according to the Introduction?

5. Who is Henry Bowman Otto Davis?

(see the answer key)

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