Analyzing Author's Purpose and Perspective in a Travelogue — Unit test Answers

Read the excerpt from "Children of the Drug Wars."To permanently stem this flow of children, we must address the complex root causes of violence in Honduras, as well as the demand for illegal drugs in the United States that is fueling that violence.What literary device supports the author’s purpose, which is to show what has led to the refugee crisis?

Read the excerpt from chapter 8 of The Travels of Marco Polo and study the map.The city stands at the mouth or entrance of the gulf of Kalhat, so that no ship can enter or leave the gulf except by leave of its rulers. The malik of this city thus has a powerful hold over the sultan of Kerman, to whom he is subject. For sometimes the sultan imposes some due on the malik of Hormuz or one of his brethren, and they refuse to pay it, and the sultan sends an army to enforce payment.

Read the excerpt from chapter 8 of The Travels of Marco Polo.Here again good incense grows in profusion—I will tell you how. It is produced by trees of no great size, like little fir trees. They are gashed with knives in various places, and out of these gashes oozes the incense. Some of it even oozes from the tree itself without any gashing, in consequence of the great heat that prevails.

Read the excerpt from "Children of the Drug Wars."The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees recently interviewed 404 children who had arrived in the United States from Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico; 58 percent said their primary reason for leaving was violence. (A similar survey in 2006, of Central American children coming into Mexico, found that only 13 percent were fleeing violence.) They aren’t just going to the United States: Less conflicted countries in Central America had a 712 percent increase in asylum claims between 2008 and 2013.Read the excerpt from Enrique’s Journey.Enrique allows himself to doze only on trains farther north, where the gangsters no longer control the tops of the trains. There, he jams his body into the crevice on top of a hopper, next to the trapdoors used to fill the car. Or he waits until the train rounds a curve, giving him a good view of all of the cars. He spots a boxcar with its door open. When the train slows, he jumps off and races to the boxcar, jumping inside for a quick nap.

Read the excerpt from Enrique’s Journey.The train passes into northern Chiapas. Enrique sees men with hoes tending their corn and women inside their kitchens patting tortillas into shape. Cowboys ride past and smile. Fieldworkers wave their machetes and cheer the migrants on: "Qué bueno!" Mountains draw closer. Plantain fields soften into cow pastures. Enrique’s train slows to a crawl. Monarch butterflies flutter alongside, overtaking his car.

Read the excerpt from chapter 2 of Night.And so an hour or two passed. Another scream jolted us. The woman had broken free of her bonds and was shouting louder than before:"Look at the fire! Look at the flames! Flames everywhere . . .”Once again, the young men bound and gagged her. When they actually struck her, people shouted their approval:"Keep her quiet! Make that madwoman shut up. She’s not the only one here . . .”She received several blows to the head, blows that could have been lethal. Her son was clinging desperately to her, not uttering a word. He was no longer crying.

Read the excerpt from chapter 8 of The Travels of Marco Polo.This province produces great quantities of excellent white incense, and also dates in great abundance. No grain is grown here except rice, and not much of that; but it is imported from abroad at a big profit. Fish is plentiful, notably tunnies of large size, which are so abundant that two of them can be bought for a Venetian groat. The staple diet consists of rice, meat, and fish. . . . As for the incense of which I have spoken, which grows here in such profusion, the lord buys it for 10 gold bezants a cantar and then sells it to foreign merchants and others for 40 bezants a cantar. The lord of Shihr does this on behalf of the sultan of the province of Aden. For the sultan of Aden has incense bought up throughout his dominions at the price of 10 bezants and afterwards sold at 40 from which he derives an immense profit.

Read the excerpt from chapter 7 of Night.Pressed tightly against one another, in an effort to resist the cold, our heads empty and heavy, our brains a whirlwind of decaying memories. Our minds numb with indifference.

Read the excerpt from "Children of the Drug Wars."He also asked Congress to grant powers that could eliminate legal protections for children from Central America in order to expedite removals, a change that Republicans in Congress have also advocated.This would allow life-or-death decisions to be made within hours by Homeland Security officials, even though studies have shown that border patrol agents fail to adequately screen Mexican children to see if they are being sexually exploited by traffickers or fear persecution, as the agents are supposed to do. Why would they start asking Central American children key questions needed to prove refugee status?

Read the excerpt from chapter 8 of The Travels of Marco Polo.They have sheep here that have no ears, nor even ear-holes; but in the place where ears ought to be they have little horns. They are small creatures and very pretty. And here is something else that may strike you as marvelous: their domestic animals—sheep, oxen, camels, and little ponies—are fed on fish. They are reduced to this diet because in all this country and in all the surrounding regions there is no grass; but it is the driest place in the world. The fish on which these animals feed are very small and are caught in March, April, and May in quantities that are truly amazing. They are then dried and stored in the houses and given to the animals as food throughout the year. I can tell you further that the animals also eat them alive, as soon as they are drawn out of the water.