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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. According to Chapter 8.4, what is the first impulse behind American imitation of English orthography?
(a) Compromise for cheaper printing.
(b) Convenience.
(c) Anti-colonialism.
(d) Affectation.

2. Which organization produced a prospectus in 1913 that warned against extreme English conservatism in the spelling of foreign loan-words?
(a) British Literary Association.
(b) National Education Association.
(c) Simplified Spelling Board.
(d) Society for Pure English.

3. What language does the formalism of English grammarians come from?
(a) Spanish.
(b) Latin.
(c) German.
(d) French.

4. In which city are the French names of streets reported by Mencken to be beautiful but so barbarously pronounced as to be unrecognizable by a Frenchman?
(a) Lafayette.
(b) Houston.
(c) New Orleans.
(d) Baton Rouge.

5. Which impulse behind American imitation of English orthography is more influential?
(a) Affectation.
(b) Anti-colonialism.
(c) Convenience.
(d) Compromise for cheaper printing.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the longest list of spelling changes from English to American that Mencken gives in Chapter 8.1?

2. To what does Mencken ascribe the inflection of English adjectives?

3. Who is apparently the first literary critic to point out the "enormous gap between the literate and unliterate American"?

4. Mencken reports hearing of a German named "Knoche," who to avoid being called "Nokky," changed his name to what?

5. Into what was the French surname "Beauchamp" translated in America?

(see the answer keys)

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