FINAL EXAM REVIEW GUIDE
World Environmental Literature, Spring 2015
Exam time and place: Tuesday 5/5, 9-10am in our normal classroom.
What you need to bring: one blue book and a pen.
Exam length: The short final exam will take you 45-60 minutes to complete, but I will stay in the room until 1030am to make sure you have ample time. Although the university finals period is scheduled for 8am, since this test is short I will let us start a bit later at 9am.
Coverage and format: The final exam will be comprehensive, covering all readings, viewings, and lectures. The exam will include 10-15 fill-in-the-blankandmultiple choice questions. There will also be 2 short essays, each one paragraph (6-10 sentences) in length. The final is worth 10% of your total course grade.
What you need to study:
· The overview concepts covered in the introductory lectures and readings
· Major aesthetic issues and themes in the visual artworks we discussed in class
· Basic information on major environmental problems we've discussed, such as climate change, species and habitat destruction, destruction of marine ecosystems, resource scarcity, industrial toxicity, etc.
· Background information on each text and film:
· the author or director
· author’s or director's country of birth and residence
· historical period and geographic location(s) in which the artwork is set
· the major characters
· the major themes and literary/visual technique(s) of the text
· The main passages or scenes we discussed in class for each text
· Looking back at the paper prompts will also give you a sense of my main concerns
SAMPLE QUESTIONS
1) The release of Methyl Isocyanate gas at the Union Carbide plant devastated residents of what city?
2) The Sundarbans are a dense mangrove forest located on a river delta in what location?
a. South Asia b. Bangladesh c. India d. Bengal e. all of the above
3) What literary text offers its critique of the social and environmental impacts of tourism through the use of second-person narration?
a. Kincaid's A Small Place b. Mootoo's Cereus Blooms at Night c. Diaz's "Monstro" d. Yamashita's Through the Arc of the Rainforest
4) Alexis Rockman's Manifest Destiny envisions the climate-driven destruction of what location?
5) Short essay, passage identification. In a single paragraph, identify the following elements of the passage:
· Author and title of the work
· Specific details about the quotation: which characters does the passage refer to and what is happening at this point in the work?
· Meaning and significance: how is the quotation relevant to the overall themes of the work and the course?
“Look. At the heart of theology there is a premise—they will try to tell you otherwise, but if one listens carefully there is a premise that we humans are the primary sun around which the entire universe revolves. Unstated but certainly implied is the assumption that humans are by far superior to the rest of all nature, and that’s why we are the inheritors of the earth. Arrogant, isn’t it? What’s more, not all humans are part of this sun. Some of us are considered to be much lesser than others—especially if we are not Wetlandish or full-blooded or European or full-blooded white.”