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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. How does Veblen define conspicuous consumption?

2. What happens when a community develops a standard of wealth?

3. Vicarious leisure results in what?

4. What happens to the standard of wealth over time?

5. What distinction does Veblen say emerged between types of labor in cultures that had a leisure class?

Short Essay Questions

1. In what way is dress an example of conspicuous waste?

2. How does the clergy demonstrate vicarious leisure?

3. What do a man's possessions say about the man?

4. What is the relationship between the necessities of life and an individual's standard of living?

5. How did women practice production and consumption in early predatory culture?

6. How does the individual consumer think of his conspicuous waste?

7. What began with private ownership?

8. What are the two conditions necessary for the development of the leisure class?

9. How does Veblen define leisure?

10. How are the different social classes distinguished?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How do Veblen's definitions hold up in contemporary society? Are his definitions of the classes accurate? Are his definitions of the behaviors accurate? Have the times changed since he wrote "The Theory of the Leisure Class"? How have they changed? How have they remained the same?

Essay Topic 2

Can leisure be said to be a form of labor itself? Is the leisure class obligated to perform its conspicuous leisure and conspicuous consumption? Is it work? If not, why not?

Essay Topic 3

How American is "The Theory of the Leisure Class"? Is it descriptive of industrial economies generally, or is it limited to Veblen's American environment? How does he account for aristocratic or feudal culture or other European social systems?

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