Test Bank Ways of Social Change 2nd Edition by Garth M. Massey A+

Description

The questions are designed to evaluate only the reading activity and memory of your students. They do not evaluate students’ comprehension, deeper understanding and critical thinking of the book’s topics. In my experience, these can be better cultivated and evaluated in discussions and other means of assessment, for example short-answer exams, and by engaging in the Topics for Discussion and Activities for Further Study at the end of each chapter.

Questions to these readings quiz questions are arranged in the order in which the quiz material appears in each chapter, providing a measure of how far the student has read. Correct answers are indicated with an asterisk.

As with any multiple-choice question, there could be more than one right answer, but only one answer is the best answer. Other answers may be interesting, possible, and worth discussing, but they are not what the students have read in Ways of Social Change.

Chapter 1. The Personal Experience of Social Change

Social change can be understood as the accomplishment of:

1. the passing of time

*b. millions of people, living and dead

1. an unfolding plan of a deity more powerful than any human being
2. the men and women who made significant contributions to human progress

Who is the woman described in Chapter 1?

1. the author of science fiction novels
2. the CEO of one of the largest global corporations in the world
3. a scientist who was long forgotten but discovered in the 1980s

*d. no one special; just a woman who lived through much of the 20th century

Iris Summers’ children are described as:

*a. Baby Boomers

1. troubled and unable to fit into their time and place
2. a mixture of individuals with very special abilities
3. a soldier, a housewife, a doctor and a carpenter

When was the pace of social change probably the greatest?

1. the years between the founding of the United States and the Civil War
2. between 1492 and 1547

*c. the last half of the twentieth century

1. the years since the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001

One of the main reasons people adopted their family name was:

*a a government wanted to keep tabs on them, to draft them into war or tax them

1. of their religion and their desire to be identified with it
2. the need to marry “out of their lineage,” that is, in order to avoid marrying a close relative
3. the rise in geographic mobility and the need to keep in touch with those left behind

What prominent people’s names provide a record of ethnic groups’ gains in the US?

1. Presidents of the United States
2. CEOs of the largest global corporations
3. any city’s telephone directory

*d. boxers or prizefighters

What popular technology was acquired by people of modest means beginning in 1900?

1. an automobile
2. a bicycle

*c. a Kodak Brownie camera

1. a clothes washing machine

Iris Summers grew up:

a.with a silver spoon in her mouth, that is, affluent and privileged

b.before she was ready, having left school after 5^th grade and having her first child at 15

c.in a large city and spent her formative years living in the top floor of an old tenement

*d. on a farm, poor, but in a largely self-sufficient family able to provide for most of its needs

During Iris Summers’ youth and early adulthood, what great transformation was occurring:

1. science discovered the source of life

*b. farm life and agriculture, with millions of rural people and their children become part of the urban labor force

1. women’s liberation and changing gender relations
2. nuclear weapons altered the balance of international power and the nature of war

What family relationship was common when Iris Summers was a girl and is again common, but was more unusual in the middle of the last century?

1. children living with single parents
2. new couples buying homes and living close to their parents
3. blended families, with children of different biological parents forming a family when their parents divorce and remarry

*d. multi-generational households, especially with adult children and their parents living under the same roof

When he was an adult, what could Frank Summers, Iris’ husband, not understand about young people?

*a. why they would marry before they had a good job and why they didn’t marry when they did have a good job

1. their music and the way they danced without holding on to each other
2. why men and women didn’t wear their hair and dress differently, so he could easily tell the difference between young men and young women
3. what they could be talking about for so long on the phone, and later why they spent so much time social networking

Iris Summers’ husband, Frank:

*a. worked as a civilian during World War Two

1. was killed in a highway accident, leaving Iris to raise their children
2. abandoned the family because he was jobless and could not support them
3. served and was seriously wounded in the Second World War

What social change occurred in the US during Iris Summers’ life that was expected to happen as well throughout the poorest parts of the world?

1. social inequality largely disappeared as equality of opportunity expanded to include everyone

*b. agriculture was transformed into an industrial operation and living standards rose as people moved from the countryside to cities

1. people became very conscious of the environment and people changed the way they live in order to protect it for future generations
2. people had less and less interest in religion and accepted the authority of science

What was the most dramatic change in the geography of the world during Iris Summers’ lifetime?

1. the loss of forested land and the dramatic increase in farmland
2. the largest cities shifted from being those located on the coasts to inland cities where they were safer from attack
3. immigration from poor countries to richer countries swelled after mid-century

*d. 125 nations were added to the map of the world, most by gaining independence after an era of European colonialism

What technology did Iris Summers think was the best thing to happen in her lifetime?

*a. television

1. indoor plumbing
2. the home computer
3. nuclear weapons that kept the world safe

During her lifetime Iris Summers:

*a. increasingly held the belief that government should help the disadvantaged

1. became a prominent political figure, working on behalf of social change
2. divorced twice, each time thrusting her into poverty that required her to find work
3. raised her brothers and sisters, her own children, and some of her grandchildren

Public awareness campaigns promoting auto safety:

1. are financed by governments with an interest in changing people’s behavior

*b. didn’t convince Iris Summers to wear a seat belt while riding in an automobile

1. were first aired on television
2. were ineffective in reducing traffic fatalities throughout the twentieth century

What change in women’s place in society most clearly distinguished Iris Summers from her daughters and granddaughters?

1. her daughters and granddaughters could decide when they wanted to have children by using effective means of birth control and having the choice to terminate their pregnancies safely and legally
2. her daughters and granddaughters were more likely to engage in premarital sex and marry at a much later age
3. her daughters and granddaughters could run for political office without prejudice

*d. her daughters, and especially her granddaughters, were much more likely to want and need to work outside the home

On average, among Iris Summers’ children’s generation who were married in the 1960s and 1970s:

*a. about half of all marriages ended in divorce

1. women gave birth to an average of 5 children
2. almost all experimented with drugs, and nearly one in five died from a drug overdose
3. few women changed their last name to that of their new husband

What social movement probably had the greatest impact on Iris Summers’ feelings?

1. the gay rights movement
2. the anti-abortion movement

*c. the civil rights movement

1. the environmental movement

Iris Summers’ personal habits were largely shaped by her experiences during:

1. World War I

*b. the Great Depression

1. the Vietnam War
2. the dot.com bubble

When people grow older, their receptivity to social change, like that of Iris Summers, tends to be:

*a. less

1. more selective, with enthusiasm for some new things and opposition to others
2. disorienting and confusing to those around them
3. on a personal level, but not structural or cultural

Looking back on the things Iris Summers and her husband did in their everyday lives, we can see :

1. that they would have been much happier if they had embraced changes in technology rather than resisting them
2. the way they had been taught in school: to learn by rote, to memorize, and to follow orders
3. that their children were all they lived for; once the children were grown their life stopped

*d. that their actions were very appropriate for an awareness of environmental limitations and the depletion of natural resources, but that’s not why they did them

During the twentieth century labor unions in the US:

1. adopted a socialist, and sometimes communist, ideology which most Americans spurned
2. formed a powerful political party that became the modern Democratic Party

*c. grew to include 2 out of every 5 workers, before membership declined in the second half of the century

1. avoided becoming a social movement seeking social change

Family income in the US between 1976 and 2006, even those where both wife and husband were employed:

1. declined for all Americans, but still remained the highest in the world
2. was mostly earned from ownership of stocks and bonds, rather than wages and salaries

*c. increased very little for most people, but grew tremendously for the very affluent and the rich

1. remained lower than in most other industrialized countries

How does income inequality in the US rate in comparison to other affluent nations?

1. it is impossible to know because different countries use different currencies of different value

*b. it is highest

1. it is the lowest; that is, income is more equitably distributed in the US than anywhere else
2. it is about average, with some countries having more and some having less income inequality

The discussion of inequality of income and wealth has lots of numbers, almost all of them saying that:

1. if you work hard and play by the rules, you’ll get ahead
2. the US looks very much like socialist nations in Europe

*c. the rich get richer and everybody else either gets poorer or is treading water

1. no amount of income and wealth can bring people happiness

Most people earning the minimum wage in the US:

1. are teenagers working part-time jobs
2. prefer the convenience of a job that requires little responsibility and lets them work only a few hours a week
3. object to social movements that try to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour

*d. are adults with high school diplomas

In the book, what is meant by “the state”?

1. any geographic unit anywhere in the world with jurisdiction over counties and towns
2. the condition of life at any given point in time

*c. the system of power administered by govern­ments

1. any one of the fifty states in the United States

Which of the following statements best describes Iris Summers’ generation?

*a. they benefited greatly from government programs, spending and regulations

1. they experienced severe economic hardship most of their life
2. they were fortunate not to have had a major war fought requiring them to risk their life
3. they distrusted science and preferred technologies they could understand intuitively

Most people experience social change as:

1. disruption to the world in which they are comfortably adapted
2. a fish experiences the water: they’d perish without it but are largely unaware of it
3. publicly dramatic and exciting to watch but personally inconsequential

*d. personal change, i.e. changes in their circumstances, opportunities, and immediate environment

The idea that social change is (and is entirely) the sum total of individual changes is:

1. social realism
2. true for people, but not true for animal societies that also change

*c. one way to think about social change, but gives an incomplete picture

1. was popular many decades ago, but is not credible today

A good definition of social change sees it as a widespread alteration in:

1. social structure
2. social thinking
3. culture

*d. both social structure and culture

What accounts for the high divorce rate since the middle of the last century?

1. women’s greater economic independence as they entered the workforce in greater numbers
2. growing and greater expectations about what a marriage should be
3. longevity, that is, people live longer and so have a longer time to consider divorce

*d. All of the above contribute to the rising divorce rate

World population grew very little until:

*a. the end of the last Ice Age (12,000 years ago), increasing with the advent of plant and animal cultivation

1. the elimination of most global diseases in the 19^th century
2. the end of slavery around the world
3. population has grown quickly and steadily as long people have lived, but in the past wars and diseases killed most of them

Which of the following statements about the world’s population is true?

1. Population is expected to grow to more than 900,00,000 by the year 2020
2. There is no data on the world’s population before 1950, but it probably has doubled since 1950

*c. There were about 1 billion people when the United States was founded and today it is more than 7 billion people

1. In 2025 it essentially stabilized because of high death rates in poor countries and low birth rates in affluent countries

What was probably the main reason the work people did could be more specialized, leading to a more complex society and one where technology and the arts could more readily be developed?

1. the development of the national state and a more rational form of social organization
2. the domestication of animals

* c. greater production of food by a smaller portion of the society’s population

1. the development of monotheistic religion that bound more people together, thus reducing the destruction of warfare between small, tribal societies

What are the two “master trends” or “master processes” that dominated and changed societies the past 500 years?

*a. development of capitalism and the formation of national states

1. the decline in religion and the rise of science to take its place
2. globalization and population migration
3. growing social complexity and the pursuit of personal growth

There are several types of capitalism, but the most dynamic form that began in Europe after 1500:

1. was borrowed from China
2. taxed those who lived off the work of others and gave the revenue to those who needed it the most
3. was based on a belief in a God who rewarded wealth and material abundance

*d. sought to rationally organize economic activities as a way to create profit

What term describes mercantile capitalism’s engagement in the slave trade that originated in England and brought slaves to the Americas?

1. economic barbarism

*b. the triangle trade

1. the Anglo-American corporation
2. neo-colonialism

After 1500 an emerging capitalist economy based on the pursuit of profit:

*a. provided funding for the growth of the state while “buying” state protection and support for its economic activities

1. caused the economy of Europe to shrink
2. was imported from Asia to Europe
3. encouraged people to continue working in agriculture and remain living in rural areas

Benedict Anderson describes the modern nation, based on personal identification with one’s country and its “ability to enlist loyalty and patriotism” as:

1. thoroughly modern
2. a gemeinschaft
3. a pseudo-democracy

*d. an imagined community

Some people suggest that the 21^st century will be:

1. a new Dark Ages

*b. the Asian Century

1. without war
2. the shortest in human history

The development of capitalism involved expanding economic activity worldwide and changing the societies it encountered to facilitate this economic expansion. In a word, this is:

1. neo-imperialism
2. globalization

*c. colonialism

1. merchantilism

In 2009 a young woman was shot and killed during protests in Iran, and:

1. her American husband was imprisoned

*b. her murder was captured on a cell phone; the image sped around the world

1. she turned out to be a man who had participated in the 9/11 airline hijackings
2. the crowd blamed it on the police, even though her own brother killed her

What best describes today’s global population:

*a. birth rates are declining and population growth is slowing

1. it is accelerating at an alarming rate
2. it is growing fastest in affluent countries and slowest in poor countries
3. women are quickly outnumbering men worldwide and in all age categories

Nearly 200 years ago Thomas Malthus recommended “positive measures” to:

1. prevent the spread of diseases
2. improve the status of women in society
3. encourage research and the development of modern science

*d. slow population growth, though he doubted this could prevent widespread famine

Despite the opinion of demographers, population dynamics:

*a. are not a driver of social change; they are explained by the things that impel social change, such as new technology and actions by the state

1. make little difference in how people in a society live
2. are not affected by birth and death rates
3. are fueled by political ideology and religious zealotry

The discussion of social change the last 100 years, and in the life of Iris Summers, shows that:

1. the world is changing much more slowly than in centuries past
2. a disaster that will probably end the human race as we know it is imminent

*c. some things today are more like they were a hundred years ago than fifty years ago

1. social change is neither linear nor cyclic, but more like an oscillating wave

In this first chapter you can see that Ways of Social Change is primarily about:

1. revolutions and other forms of social transformation
2. women and minorities, and how they have gained access to equal opportunity

*c. the things that drive or cause changes in social life for the past 500 years

1. history, i.e. the record of the past

The “drivers” of social change discussed in this book include:

*a. science and technology, social movements, war, large corporations, and the state

1. nongovernmental organizations and international organizations such as the UN
2. revolutions and natural disasters
3. population dynamics, exceptional individuals, cultural imagination, and environmental collapse