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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Who is Elisabeth Judas-Forster?
(a) A critic of Bataille's.
(b) Andre Masson's lover.
(c) Bataille's girlfriend.
(d) Nietzsche's sister.

2. What does Baumler call revolution?
(a) Awareness of the future.
(b) Rebellion against modernity.
(c) Renewal of the past.
(d) Social engineering.

3. What is the significance of the image of the labyrinth in the "The Labyrinth"?
(a) It is a metaphor for being.
(b) It is a metaphor for social existence.
(c) It is a symbol of man's inner state.
(d) It represents the deadly stakes in self-knowledge.

4. What does homogeneity depend on?
(a) A productive system.
(b) Owners keeping the workers down.
(c) Continual revolution.
(d) Workers owning the means of production.

5. What does Bataille say is the only religion for fascists?
(a) Christianity.
(b) Technology.
(c) Power.
(d) Race.

6. Which of the following does Bataille NOT use as an example of unproductive expenditure without value beyond itself?
(a) War.
(b) Art.
(c) Public gardens.
(d) Luxuries.

7. What does Bataille say scientists said about the dialectic?
(a) It was the one true science.
(b) It was a matter of faith.
(c) It was demonstrated in evolution.
(d) It was incompatible with science.

8. What are the two classes Bataille divides consumption into?
(a) Conspicuous consumption and invisible consumption.
(b) Productive consumption and wasteful consumption.
(c) Conservation of life and productive activity.
(d) Sacrificial consumption and gift consumption.

9. What does Bataille say Nietzsche questions?
(a) How a people's spirit can be expressed.
(b) How a people's technology can be fulfilled.
(c) How an ideal can be discovered in the past.
(d) How an ideology can be invented.

10. What does Bataille say about meaning in "The Sorcerer's Apprentice"?
(a) Things can only have meaning if they motivate actions.
(b) Things cannot have meaning unless they are historical realities.
(c) Things can only have meaning when they are fictitious.
(d) Things can only have meaning if there is a consensus about them.

11. What did fascism use Nietzsche's writing to oppose?
(a) The view of the past being taught in German schools.
(b) The current political system.
(c) Sentimentalism.
(d) The policies of Daladier.

12. Whom does Bataille say can never touch the reality of earth?
(a) Fascists.
(b) Those who do not understand it.
(c) Those who exploit the earth for profit.
(d) Capitalists.

13. What creatures' 'being' does Bataille compare in "The Labyrinth"?
(a) Man and dog.
(b) Snake and sponge.
(c) Bird and dog.
(d) Dog and sponge.

14. What did Engels work for eight years to develop, but ultimately disavow?
(a) A dialectics of manufacturing.
(b) A dialectics of religion.
(c) A dialectics of mathematics.
(d) A dialectics of nature.

15. What does the homogeneous part of society purchase?
(a) Production.
(b) Workers.
(c) Unions.
(d) Capital.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Bataille say is analogous to the maternal breast?

2. Where does fascism originate?

3. What was Nietzsche's relationship with fascism, in Bataille's account?

4. What claim does Bataille make in "The Obelisk"?

5. What does Bataille say the theory of conspicuous consumption is used for?

(see the answer keys)

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