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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 Bakha feel about Charat Singh, most of the time?

2. What advice does the second woman in the alley houses offer Bakha?

3. What does Chota suggest Bakha distract himself from the woes of his morning with?

4. Whom does Bakha see working in the river on his way to Ram Charan's sister's wedding?

5. What is implied by Bakha's feeling like a "giant" when he looks back at the outcastes' colony after fleeing his home?

Short Essay Questions

1. Although Bakha is honored by Charat Singh's actions, in what sense are they also condescending and dismissive of Bakha's humanity?

2. What does Bakha tell himself about his decision to go to Ram Charan's sister's wedding, and what are his true motives?

3. Despite his hunger, how does Bakha end up too nauseated to eat the food his brother brings home?

4. What stories about Charat Singh's hockey career does Bakha think about while he is waiting for Charat Singh to appear?

5. What game does Bakha remember playing with his friends and Ram Charan's sister when they were young children?

6. Even before Charat Singh gives Bakha the hockey stick, what does he do that causes Bakha to feel very honored?

7. Why do all of the sepoys and local children long to own the solar topee?

8. What puzzles Bakha about his having had the courage to ask a sentry for the solar topee when he was a child, and why does it puzzle him?

9. When Bakha is on his way to see Charat Singh about the hockey stick, what strange feeling does he have about the errand?

10. How does Chota react differently to Bakha's stories about the priest and the woman at the alley house?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay that analyzes Untouchable's message about hope. Consider the characterization of Bakha as well as the novel's action. Give special consideration to the novel's final pages. Support your assertions with evidence from the text.

Essay Topic 2

Look up the postcolonial term "mimicry." Then, write an essay in which you explore the relationship of this term to the choices that Bakha and his friends make. Take a position about why they do what they do, what the consequences--positive and negative--are for them, and what messages about both status and colonization are being transmitted through this aspect of Untouchable. Defend your ideas with textual evidence from the novel as well as from online sources, and be sure to cite your sources in MLA format.

Essay Topic 3

Consider the symbol of the solar topee in conjunction with the text's references to heat, fire, and sun. Write an essay in which you analyze the solar topee as a part of a textual motif regarding how authority is misused to shield people from accountability for their inhumane actions. Offer both quoted and paraphrased evidence from the text in support of your claims.

(see the answer keys)

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