Unit Test Answers

Which is the best definition of the term “magic realism”?

Read the excerpt from Amy Tan’s essay “Mother Tongue.”I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say. That is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect.What is the purpose of this text?

Read the excerpt from "Mother Tongue."Yet some of my friends tell me they understand 50 percent of what my mother says. Some say they understand 80 to 90 percent. Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, my mother’s English is perfectly clear, perfectly natural. It’s my mother tongue. Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery. That was the language that helped shape the way I saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world. Which best summarizes the central idea of the excerpt?

Read the excerpt from Frederick Douglass’s speech “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.Which of the following best describes Douglass’s word choice in this excerpt?

Read the passage from “Child of the Americas.”I speak English with passion: it’s the tongue of my consciousness, a flashing knife blade of crystal, my tool, my craft.How does the imagery create a visual of the speaker’s use of English?

Read the excerpt from “The Latin Deli: An Ars Poetica.”plain ham and cheesethat would cost less at the A&P, but it would not satisfythe hunger of the fragile old man lost in the foldsof his winter coat, who brings her lists of items that he reads to her like poetry, or the others,whose needs she must divine, conjuring up productsfrom places that now exist only in their hearts—closed ports she must trade with.Which best describes how the author’s word choice affects the tone of the poem?

Read this excerpt from "Choreographers of Matter, Life, and Intelligence."With Newton’s mechanics came powerful machines, and eventually the steam engine, the motive force which reshaped the world by overturning agrarian society, spawning factories and stimulating commerce. . . .What is the meaning of the underlined term?

Read the two excerpts about Pilar from Dreaming in Cuban.Excerpt 1: They called me brujita, little witch. I stared at them, tried to make them go away.Excerpt 2: Another woman, an elderly mulatta, claimed that her hair was falling out from the menacing stares the baby gave her. Which statement is the best synthesis for the two excerpts?

Read the excerpt from "Mother Tongue."Those tests were constructed around items like fill-in-the-blank sentence completion, such as “Even though Tom was ______, Mary thought he was _____.” And the correct answer always seemed to be the most bland combinations of thoughts, for example, “Even though Tom was foolish, Mary thought he was ridiculous.” Well, according to my mother, there were very few limitations as to what Tom could have been and what Mary might have thought of him. So I never did well on tests like that. Which information from the excerpt best supports the inference that achievement tests ignore imagination as an element of language ability?

Read the excerpt from Sandra Cisneros’s story "Mericans."There are those walking to church on their knees. Some with fat rags tied around their legs and others with pillows, one to kneel on, and one to flop ahead. There are women with black shawls crossing and uncrossing themselves. There are armies of penitents carrying banners and flowered arches while musicians play tinny trumpets and tinny drums. What cultural element is revealed in this excerpt?

Read the excerpt from "Mother Tongue."I am a writer. And by that definition, I am someone who has always loved language. I am fascinated by language in daily life. I spend a great deal of my time thinking about the power of language—the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth. Language is the tool of my trade. And I use them all—all the Englishes I grew up with.How does Tan build a central idea of her story in the excerpt?

How does Michio Kaku develop the idea of an impending scientific revolution in “Choreographers of Matter, Life, and Intelligence”?

Read the excerpt from Cristina Garcia’s Dreaming in Cuban.The sunset flares behind a row of brownstones, linking them as if by a flaming ribbon. Lourdes massages her eyes and begins walking with legs that feel held by splints.“I’m glad to see you, Lourdes. Thank you for everything, hija, the hat, the cigars. You buried me like an Egyptian king, with all my valuables!” Jorge del Pino laughs.Lourdes perceives the faint scent of her father’s cigar . . .“Where are you, Papi?”The street is vacant, as if a force has absorbed all living things. Even the trees seem more shadow than substance.“Nearby,” her father says, serious now.The author uses magic realism by

Read this excerpt from "Talking Robots."Of course, neural networks still have a long way to go before they can model the human brain. As physicist Heinz Pagels has said: “The difference between a real neuron and the model neurons . . . is like the difference between a human hand and a pair of pliers.” But the fact that a simple neural network can speak at all is remarkable, indicating that perhaps human abilities can be simulated by electronics. . . . Which is the most accurate summary of Kaku’s argument?

According to the speaker’s perspective in the poem “The Latin Deli: An Ars Poetica,” what is poetic about the deli?