View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. On page 12, Wilkerson says that some contagions can only be managed with "vigilance." How is she proposing they should be managed?
(a) With constant watchfulness.
(b) With brute force.
(c) With great speed.
(d) With careful thoroughness.

2. In the page 15 sentence "An old house is its own kind of devotional, a dowager aunt with a story to be coaxed out of her," the idea that the house has a story to tell is an example of what literary technique?
(a) Litotes.
(b) Personification.
(c) Metonymy.
(d) Apostrophe.

3. In "Chapter Five: 'The Container We Have Built for You,'" what does Harold Hale do when people knock down his mailbox?
(a) Moves to a safer neighborhood.
(b) Resets it, in concrete.
(c) Complains to the police.
(d) Forms a neighborhood watch committee.

4. In "Chapter Six: The Measure of Humanity," what does Wilkerson say we are doing when we "see" race?
(a) Perpetuating a system of oppression.
(b) Taking in only a small number of the features that actually differentiate races.
(c) Participating in a self-reinforcing cycle that causes us to "see" what we expect to see.
(d) Noting arbitrary physical signs that we have been taught to read as "race."

5. Besides the caste systems in India and the United States, which other caste system does Wilkerson say that she will focus on?
(a) Apartheid South Africa.
(b) Yuan China.
(c) Nazi Germany.
(d) The Nigerian Osu System.

Short Answer Questions

1. In "The Vitals of History," what does Wilkerson compare an honest and rigorous study of history to?

2. On page 59 of "Chapter Five: 'The Container We Have Built for You,'" when Harold Hale's daughter is about to return to school after a visit with a friend's family, what is the grandmother's response?

3. In the opening analogy of the book, what is the melting permafrost being compared to?

4. In "A Long-Running Play and the Emergence of Caste in America," what does the Nigerian playwright tell Wilkerson about Blacks in Africa?

5. According to Wilkerson's explanation on page 9, why did Democrats hesitate to impeach Trump?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Pillar Number Six: Dehumanization and Stigma," what similarities does Wilkerson see between the treatment of Blacks in the time of slavery and Jews entering Nazi camps?

2. According to Wilkerson in "An Old House and an Infrared Light," how are caste systems justified, and what is their real purpose?

3. Summarize the analogy Wilkerson makes between the thawing of the Siberian permafrost and the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

4. According to "A Long-Running Play and the Emergence of Caste in America," what was the original justification for lifetime enslavement, and how did that justification need to change as circumstances changed?

5. What explanation does Wilkerson give of the origins of caste in Hindu scriptures in "Pillar Number One: Divine Will and the Laws of Nature"?

6. In "An America Untouchable," what is the purpose of the many examples of historical writings?

7. How does Wilkerson explain the differences between race and caste?

8. For what reason does Wilkerson say that race is a social concept, not a biological one?

9. In "Pillar Number Two: Heritability," what difference does Wilkerson note between the way caste is inherited in India versus the way it was historically inherited in the U.S.?

10. According to Wilkerson, how did slavery create the conditions for American stereotypes about Black people?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,093 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample