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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Toward the beginning of the eighteenth century, in which of the following areas was there NOT an incitement to talk about sex?
(a) Technical.
(b) Economic.
(c) Domestic.
(d) Political.

2. What does Foucault mean by "we other Victorians?"
(a) We are continuing the progress of liberation from repression started by the Victorians.
(b) We are unable to willfully escape the supposed historical repression of sexuality.
(c) We are trying to restore sexuality as it was during the Victorian era.
(d) We are on the brink of the biggest change in sexuality since the Victorian era.

3. Which of the following best describes the levels of sexual discourse in the nineteenth century according to Foucault?
(a) There was just enough to feed the developing science.
(b) There was so much that the newly formed science of sex couldn't cope with it.
(c) There was so little available discourse that much of the budding science was based on hypothesis and conjecture rather than experience or evidence.
(d) Discourse had to be found in the hidden nooks and crannies it existed in.

4. Which of the following is true about the medicalization of the sexually peculiar?
(a) It recognized alternate sexualities as part of the essential nature of the person.
(b) It was distinctly unpleasant to those receiving treatment.
(c) All alternate sexualities were looked at as having the same root.
(d) There was a sensualization of power.

5. What factor supported and relayed the discourse on sex to become an essential component of society?
(a) Sensibility to new sexual boundaries.
(b) Public interest power mechanisms.
(c) A new mentality.
(d) A collective curiosity.

6. What can be said of the power mechanism(s) involved in the labeling of disparate sexualities?
(a) It's object was prohibition.
(b) It was unified and focused.
(c) It was primarily a legal and judicial.
(d) They were multi faceted and diverse.

7. What does Foucault say that the science of sex achieved in the nineteenth century?
(a) Laying the groundwork for a meticulous scientific course of study.
(b) The study of sex in a detached manner.
(c) The direct confrontation of a social taboo.
(d) The obscuration of truth about sex.

8. Per Foucault, what happened the "will to knowledge" about sexuality under the taboo of sexuality?
(a) It was driven underground and become occult.
(b) It became the domain of the upper classes and those in power.
(c) It led to the creation of the science of sexuality.
(d) It was nearly extinguished by imposed silence.

9. What does Foucault say are the results of power exercised over sex?
(a) It has disseminated and implanted polymorphous sexualities.
(b) It has effectively confined sexuality to the home.
(c) It has defined and limited social sexual mores.
(d) It has obeyed a priciple of rigorous selection.

10. Why is the author of "My Secret Life" an interesting example in Foucault's argument?
(a) Because he was turning sex into discourse for his own pleasure.
(b) Because he represented the negative effects of repression.
(c) Because he was part of the institutionalization of sexual discourse.
(d) Because he was a window into the popular social norms of the time.

11. What were the two places of tolerance to arise as a result of the confinement of sexuality?
(a) The mental hospital and the lower class.
(b) The brothel and the lower class.
(c) The brothel and mental hospital.
(d) The mental hospital and the unmarried.

12. What is the relationship between pleasure and power?
(a) They turn against each other.
(b) They seek out, overlap, and reinforce one another.
(c) They are polarized.
(d) They cancel each other out.

13. What does Foucault say about the ritual of confession?
(a) The expression of truth produces intrinsic modifications in the confessor.
(b) It is a vanishing ritual in western society.
(c) It is fundamenal human nature.
(d) It creates truth in lieu of simply expressing it.

14. Which of the following would Foucault NOT agree was a result of sexual discourse?
(a) Legal sanctions against minor perversions were multiplied.
(b) The fact of speaking about sex became more important than the moral imperatives imposed.
(c) A norm of sexual development was defined.
(d) Sexual irregularity was annexed to mental illness.

15. What need was embedded in the incitement to discourse on sex in the beginning of the eighteenth century?
(a) The expression of morally repressed desires.
(b) To spread the cleansing of the confessional to all areas of life.
(c) Rebellion against the subjugating powers.
(d) To have the discourse not come from morality alone but from rationality as well.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is Foucault NOT claiming to search for instances of?

2. Which is the form Foucault uses to define the relationship between power and pleasure?

3. What does Foucault say about the repressive hypothesis?

4. What effect did the classification of perversions have?

5. What element of the confession has opened the pathway to explore existing domains?

(see the answer keys)

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