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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. What does Veblen mean by the terms "social inertia" and "conservatism"?

2. Which class has the most martial spirit, according to Veblen?

3. What is it that Veblen says survives as society changes?

4. According to Veblen, new selections of the fittest are driven by changes in what?

5. According to Veblen, women in the leisure class are partially exempt from what?

Short Essay Questions

1. How do sports demonstrate belief in luck, or semireligious sentiment?

2. How does education form the leisure class?

3. What are the effects of devout observances?

4. How do institutions change?

5. How does the workman manifest his animistic view about luck?

6. How do men change over time according to Veblen?

7. Which classes duel? Which classes fight?

8. Where does Veblen believe the desire to gamble originates?

9. How do men and women of the industrial classes feel and react to pecuniary pressures?

10. How are leisure-class women like members of the clergy?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What would a society without conspicuous consumption be like? Is Veblen satirizing leisure class culture? By exposing the excessive consumption, is he urging us to live a somehow more genuine or less luxurious lifestyle?

Essay Topic 2

Who believes in the unseen hand, and how do people who believe in the unseen hand differ from those who do not?

Essay Topic 3

Are status symbols necessary? If social status is a fact of life for middle-class (leisure-class) people in industrial society, are status symbols necessities, or are they luxuries? Is Veblen being puritanical to see them as luxuries when pragmatically they are requirements for participation in culture?

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