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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. When does Boorstin say books began to be made cheaper, due to a variety of factors, in Chapter 4 - Section I?
(a) 1850s.
(b) 1840s.
(c) 1890s.
(d) 1910s.

2. What system does Boorstin assert affected "traditional forms of achievement," in Chapter 4 - Section VIII?
(a) Communism.
(b) The caste system.
(c) The star system.
(d) Democracy.

3. Boorstin writes that the image must exist in a kind of liminal state "between expectation and" what?
(a) Reality.
(b) Morality.
(c) Logic.
(d) Truth.

4. What refers to a physical likeness or representation of a person, animal, or thing, photographed, painted, sculptured, or otherwise made visible?
(a) Ideal.
(b) Image.
(c) Archetype.
(d) Prestige.

5. When did P.T. Barnum purchase Scudder's American Museum?
(a) 1841.
(b) 1905.
(c) 1867.
(d) 1859.

Short Answer Questions

1. Who developed an early printing press in 1436?

2. Boorstin states, regarding foreign affairs, "I suspect we suffer abroad simply because people know America through" what?

3. What does Boorstin describe as a kind of pseudo-event, especially in the sense that they were "more vivid and more impressive than the spontaneous original"?

4. In Chapter 5 - Section IV, Boorstin describes how the appearance of advertising has caused a movement from focusing on truth to focusing on what?

5. Boorstin writes in Chapter 6 - Section III, "We fill our lives not with experience but with the ____ of experience."

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Boorstin assert is the impact of art reproductions?

2. What does Boorstin assert are the greatest challenges for America and our relationship to the rest of the world?

3. How does Boorstin define "passivity" in the image in Chapter 5 - Section I?

4. What is the fourth aspect of the image, according to Boorstin in Chapter 5 - Section I?

5. What are the first two aspects of images discussed by Boorstin in Chapter 5 - Section I?

6. What does Boorstin write of the evolution of linguistics and the pseudo-event in Chapter 6 - Section III?

7. What does Boorstin write of stage and film adaptations in Chapter 4 - Section VI?

8. How does Boorstin view the impact of advertising on the American psyche?

9. What is the first aspect of "successful advertising" described by Boorstin? What example does he provide?

10. How does Boorstin compare domestic and foreign issues in Chapter 6 - Section III?

(see the answer keys)

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