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. How are the two tales, "On Mortality" and "On Mortality Again" similar?
(a) Both tales have the same mood or tone.
(b) Both tales are about achieving immortality for humanity.
(c) The main character in both tales is the same.
(d) The setting of both tales is the same.

2. Why does Kingston think that Stockton is a special place to live?
(a) Kingston's grandfathers worked on the tracks in Stockton where Kingston and her family live.
(b) Flocks of hoboes were always around the tracks, keeping the city entertaining.
(c) Stockton, CA, is the only city with three intersecting railroads.
(d) Kingston could ride the trains anytime she wanted.

3. What is the significance of the court case, Chae Chan Ping v. The United States?
(a) This is the first case to address the issue of Sojourners.
(b) Congressmen call for the United States to be made up of a limited amount of elderly Chinese people.
(c) This case adds one year of hard labor for illegal Chinese immigrants before being deported.
(d) This is the first case of a Chinese fighting against the Chinese Exclusion Acts.

4. What does Ah Goong say about working in the tunnels?
(a) Day becomes night.
(b) Mountains of dirt walked out of the tunnel.
(c) The sound of hammers only stop at night.
(d) Time and space stop inside the tunnel.

5. What is the simile "like a knot of ginger root" referring to?
(a) Tang's broken and stacked toes
(b) the veins in Tang's broken feet
(c) the shape of Tang's ears
(d) Tang's arthritic hands

Short Answer Questions

1. Why is there a communal dining room at the Chinese village where Kingston's ancestors lived?

2. What indicates to the young man in "The Ghostmate" that the woman is "old style"?

3. Which is the setting for Kingston's biography of great grandfather Bak Goong in "The Great Grandfather of Sandalwood Mountains"?

4. What action does Maui take that tells the reader where Hina sleeps?

5. Which Supreme Court case overturns San Francisco safety ordinances, thereby admitting that California laws are designed to harass Chinese immigrants?

Short Essay Questions

1. Identify and describe two historical allusions Kingston makes in "The Grandfather of the Sierra Nevada Mountains."

2. Describe how the author uses personification in "The Great Grandfather from the Sandalwood Mountains." Give examples from the text.

3. Describe the basis of the queue tax.

4. What is the significance of the long path that leads to the widow's house in "The Ghostmate"?

5. Describe the way the women pierce Tang Ao's ears and what they do to keep the holes open. Include examples of sensory details the author uses in the text.

6. Evaluate the methods Kingston uses to reveal the passage of time while Ah Goong is working in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

7. Explain the cause for the children's confusion and its effects on the characters in "On Fathers."

8. Explain how the author uses foreshadowing in the first two lines of "On Mortality."

9. How does Kingston employ humor in "On Mortality Again"?

10. Describe the way great grandfather Bak Goong ends up working in the Sandalwood Mountains in Hawaii?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,322 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample