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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Sontag discusses a famous series of photographs taken by Tyler Hicks, titled "A Nation Challenged." What does this series depict?
(a) A wounded Taliban soldier.
(b) The destruction of the Twin Towers.
(c) Osama Bin Laden.
(d) Hugo Chavez.

2. Sontag lists many effects of photographs depicting war victims. Which of the following was not one of the effects she lists?
(a) "They create the illusion of consensus."
(b) "They simplify."
(c) "They inspire."
(d) "They reiterate."

3. Which was the first war to be covered by television cameras?
(a) The War on Terror.
(b) Desert Storm.
(c) The Vietnam War.
(d) The Korean War.

4. Sontag argues that the most extensive kind of censorship is which of the following?
(a) The self-censorship of broadcast companies.
(b) Military censorship.
(c) The censorship implied by public sensibility.
(d) Government censorship.

5. The Brady group's approach to war photography differed from Fenton's approach in which of the following ways?
(a) The Brady group was commissioned by the government, while Fenton was not.
(b) The Brady group had permission to access the fields, while Fenton did not.
(c) The Brady group photographed the war without government permission, while Fenton had permission for his work.
(d) The Brady group was not commissioned by the government, while Fenton was.

Short Answer Questions

1. To whom did the "Here Is New York" exhibit donate the proceeds?

2. In its early days, photography was thought to:

3. Sontag suggests that the camera always "kept company with _________".

4. Sontag argues that creating lasting interest in war image requires which of the following?

5. Which of the following is true about representations of the dead or dying in American media?

Short Essay Questions

1. Discuss the reaction of the British public to the image of trenches of unburied bodies taken 10 days after a British defeat during the Boer War. What does this reaction say about the sensibility of the public?

2. According to Sontag, do people prefer artistic renderings or straight-forward representations of atrocities? Why?

3. How did war journalism change during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39)? How did the coverage of this war more closely resemble modern media coverage of conflicts?

4. Sontag distinguished between "image makers" and "image takers". What is the difference between these two groups of artists? How are they perceived differently?

5. How do captions sway interpretations of images? Discuss one of the examples Sontag provides in Chapter 1.

6. Sontag asserted that "cameras have always kept company with death." What did she mean by this assertion?

7. According to Sontag, how are standards for journalism determined in an era of tele-controlled warfare?

8. Discuss the purpose of Virginia Woolf's "Three Guineas" as explained by Sontag, and explain why Sontag opens her book with this reference.

9. Sontag compared the photograph to a maxim or a proverb. Explain this comparison. What does it tell us about the nature or impact of photographs?

10. Explain Sontag's objection to the idea that a news broadcasting program can "give you the world." Why did she argue that compressing world news into broadcasted programming is bad?

(see the answer keys)

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