Deck 23: Perspectives on the Present

Question 1

African Americans constitute roughly what percentage of America's prison population?

A)21%
B)47%
C)68%
D)83%

Answer 1

47%

Question 2

In two separate 2007 cases,the Supreme Court struck down programs in Louisville and Seattle which

A)required students with special needs to attend schools far located from their homes.
B)allowed children to attend schools outside their neighborhoods in the hopes of encouraging racial diversity.
C)enforced a rigid system of busing to ensure that each school had roughly the same racial profile as every other school in its district.
D)allowed home-schooled students,almost all of whom were black,to participate in high school athletics,despite their poor performance on standard tests.

Answer 2

allowed children to attend schools outside their neighborhoods in the hopes of encouraging racial diversity.

Question 3

Democrats and blacks alleged that many African-American voters were systematically disenfranchised during the 2000 presidential election in which crucial state?

A)California
B)Texas
C)New York
D)Florida

Answer 3

Florida

Question 4

All of the following factors contribute to the unhealthiness of much of the black population EXCEPT

A)the dietary options readily available in many predominantly black communities.
B)the high rates of pollution and crime in inner-city black communities.
C)the reliance of most blacks on private or employment-based healthcare.
D)miscommunication and mutual suspicion between undereducated blacks and their healthcare providers.

Question 5

Who was mayor of New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005?

A)Ray Nagin
B)John Logan
C)William Julius Wilson
D)Andrew Goodman

Question 6

Which of the following statements about Hurricane Katrina is LEAST accurate?

A)The effects of the hurricane left more than 1500 people dead.
B)The National Guard did not arrive to assist stranded survivors of the storm until a week after the storm had struck.
C)Approximately 25,000 survivors sought refuge in the Superdome,which quickly became overcrowded and fetid.
D)The white mayor of New Orleans refused to issue an evacuation order until after the storm had struck.

Question 7

In 2004,an effort to gain compensation for the survivors and heirs of the 1921 Tulsa race riot through the courts was

A)successful,laying the groundwork for more reparations claims related to past racial discrimination.
B)defeated on the ground that compensation would undermine the sovereignty of the state of Oklahoma.
C)successful,though the presiding judge cautioned that the unique circumstances of the Tulsa riot made the decision inapplicable to other cases related to past racial discrimination.
D)tossed out on the ground that the statute of limitations on the crime in question had already elapsed.

Question 8

According to More Than Just Race,by sociologist William Julius Wilson,

A)blacks at all educational levels experience significantly higher rates of unemployment than whites at the same levels.
B)blacks at all educational levels experience nearly identical rates of unemployment as whites at the same levels.
C)the gap between black and white unemployment rates,though wide for undereducated individuals,narrows to almost nothing between blacks and whites with college degrees.
D)the gap between black and white unemployment rates,though wide for uneducated individuals,widens even further between blacks and whites with college degrees.

Question 9

Which congressperson has,with little success,introduced legislation every year since 1989 in hopes of creating a commission to consider the possibility of paying reparations for slavery to African Americans?

A)Ray Nagin
B)Charles Ogletree
C)Randall Robinson
D)John Conyers,Jr.

Question 10

As of 2007,all of the following states' legislatures had issued apologies for their past roles in slavery EXCEPT

A)Alabama.
B)South Carolina.
C)Virginia.
D)Maryland.

Question 11

Which of the following statements about Hip Hop is LEAST accurate?

A)It represents a distinctly "black" phenomenon,as evidenced by its popularity in Africa and failure to find audiences in Europe and Asia.
B)Accompanying the spread of Hip Hop music itself is a lucrative line of clothing and other products associated with Hip Hop style.
C)Hip Hop is used in many places throughout the world as a form of entertainment as well as a vehicle for expressing resistance to prevailing injustices.
D)Along with the commercialized style of Hip Hop superstars there exists another,"underground" style composed of a variety of local variations.

Question 12

Under President George W.Bush,Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice both served as

A)national security advisor.
B)chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
C)secretary of state.
D)secretary of defense.

Question 13

What effect did Hurricane Katrina have on race relations in the United States?

A)It convinced the majority of whites and blacks alike that the federal government was indifferent to the plight of blacks.
B)It showed that race and poverty were no longer intertwined,at least in the context of New Orleans.
C)It left half of the African-American population convinced that the federal government responded slowly to Katrina because most of its victims were black.
D)Press coverage of the event evidenced none of the implicit racism which had been apparent in the media in earlier decades.

Question 14

Which of the following statements about the health of black Americans is LEAST accurate?

A)Immigrants from majority-black countries experience worse health than blacks born in the United States,and the longer they live in the U.S.the healthier they become.
B)Black Americans are roughly five times as likely to die from asthma than non-black Americans.
C)While diabetes is afflicting more and more Americans of all types,it has struck African Americans to a disproportionate degree.
D)Of all American groups,black Americans have the shortest life expectancies and are more than 30% more likely to die of cancer than white Americans.

Question 15

Which black performer notoriously proclaimed that,"George Bush doesn't care about black people" during a live broadcast of a Hurricane Katrina benefit concert?

A)Kanye West
B)50 Cent
C)Busta Rhymes
D)Mos Def

Question 16

Which of the following statements about the American prison system is LEAST accurate?

A)The crackdown on illicit drugs of the sort often found in poorer communities has resulted in large numbers of prisoners serving long sentences for nonviolent crimes.
B)The job-skills training and educational classes available through the prison systems ironically make ex-convicts from poor neighborhoods more hirable than if they had stayed in school.
C)The number of prisoners incarcerated in the United States has increased by more than two million since 1970.
D)Blacks are imprisoned at higher rates than other groups in part because they are typically placed under closer police surveillance than other groups.

Question 17

Which of the following statements about the spread of HIV/AIDS in black communities is LEAST accurate?

A)The homophobic attitudes of large segments of the black community have obstructed an honest assessment of the syndrome's spread.
B)Although blacks represent less than 15 percent of the American population,they represent half of the nation's HIV/AIDS sufferers.
C)The high incarceration rate of black men contributes significantly to the spread of HIV/AIDS in the broader black community.
D)Because the syndrome is passed primarily through homosexual sex between men,black women have been largely spared from its ravages.

Question 18

Approximately what percentage of the black vote went to George W.Bush in the 2000 presidential election?

A)10
B)25
C)35
D)60

Question 19

In the cases of Grutter v.Bollinger and Gratz v.Bollinger,two cases related to affirmative action decided on the same day,the Supreme Court

A)unanimously decided that affirmative action policies at public universities violated the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
B)affirmed,though only by one vote,the right of public universities to take race into consideration in admissions without restriction.
C)left the question of affirmative action in a nebulous state by striking down one affirmative action program but affirming another.
D)unanimously decided that public universities could take race into consideration in admissions without restriction.

Question 20

In the 2004 case of Vieth v.Jubelirer,the Supreme Court struck a blow against black electoral participation when it

A)placed strong restrictions on the practice of gerrymandering.
B)ruled that state-issued voter identification cards did not constitute a form of poll tax,even if citizens had to pay a fee to obtain them.
C)decided that policies which incidentally disenfranchised innocent persons were constitutional as long as the policies served the greater good of the community.
D)limited the ability of senators to filibuster against harmful proposed legislation.

Question 21

Figures such as Ras Baraka and groups such as Project Blowed are leaders in the effort to

A)steer black youths away from Hip Hop music to more traditional-and supposedly less immoral-musical forms such as jazz.
B)purge Hip Hop of its violent and misogynistic imagery and make it a vehicle of political engagement and community activism.
C)recruit famous Hip Hop artists to draw attention to such problems as poverty,civil war,and HIV/AIDS in the developing world,particularly Africa.
D)ensure that Hip Hop's popularity benefits black communities financially by supporting black-owned record labels and production companies.

Question 22

Which country's music scene has blended Hip Hop with its traditional tassou performances to produce international stars such as MC Solaar and Duggy Tee?

A)Nigeria
B)Morocco
C)Senegal
D)South Africa

Question 23

Which of the following states has experienced the steepest decline in its African-American population?

A)Georgia
B)Florida
C)Arizona
D)California

Question 24

Which Harvard scholar has pioneered the application of genetic technologies to genealogical research to help famous African Americans discover their ethnic heritage?

A)Henry Louis Gates,Jr.
B)Ben Carson
C)William Julius Wilson
D)John Logan

Question 25

Which segment of the black American population is most likely to attribute failures or difficulties to racism?

A)Afro-Caribbeans
B)African immigrants
C)African Americans
D)Afro-Caribbeans,African Americans,and African immigrants are all equally likely to attribute failures or difficulties to racism.

Question 26

The majority of Afro-Caribbean immigrants to the United States come from which two countries?

A)Jamaica and Haiti
B)Haiti and Cuba
C)Cuba and Barbados
D)Barbados and the Dominican Republic

Question 27

What was "Camp Obama"?

A)a training session designed to turn grassroots volunteers into effective political organizers
B)the Republican Party's name for what it saw as an unfairly pro-Obama American media
C)a summer camp set up by Barack Obama to bring white and black children with little direct experience of other racial groups together
D)a small group of political insiders who lent their skills and experience to the relatively inexperienced presidential candidate

Question 28

Which of the following is NOT one of the major factors contributing to the new "Great Migration" of the early twenty-first century?

A)real estate prices
B)natural disasters
C)job markets
D)cost of living

Question 29

An African immigrant to the United States is LEAST likely to have emigrated from which of the following countries?

A)Nigeria
B)Ghana
C)Ethiopia
D)Liberia

Question 30

What role did Hip Hop artists play in the 2008 presidential election?

A)For the first time,in the 2008 election Hip Hop artists became directly involved in political recruitment and voting drives.
B)The role of Hip Hop artists in the 2008 election was essentially negative,as both candidates distanced themselves from the movement in order to appeal to middle-class white voters.
C)During the 2008 election,Barack Obama gave rappers an insider role in his campaign,and reached out to the Hip Hop nation through new computer-based technologies.
D)Disillusioned by the weak government response to Hurricane Katrina,few Hip Hop artists took any role in the political campaign.

Question 31

How many African Americans had served in the U.S.Senate throughout American history before Barack Obama took his seat there in 2005?

A)1
B)4
C)8
D)13

Question 32

Barack Obama's presidential candidacy was nearly derailed by an inflammatory sermon delivered by

A)Jesse Jackson.
B)Al Sharpton.
C)Jeremiah Wright.
D)Ralph Abernathy.

Question 33

Which of the following statements about Barack Obama's presidential election is LEAST accurate?

A)Ninety percent of the people who voted for his opponent were white.
B)Almost seventy percent of the people who voted for the first time in 2008 voted for Obama.
C)Despite winning a commanding majority of the popular vote,Obama won by only a small handful of electoral votes.
D)Obama was the first Democrat to win more than 51 percent of the popular vote in over forty years.

Question 34

As part of a new "Great Migration" in the early twenty-first century,African Americans are moving

A)from the Northeast to the South.
B)from the North to the West.
C)from the West to the Northeast.
D)from the South to the Midwest.

Question 35

The cities with the largest African-American populations as of 2004 included all of the following EXCEPT

A)Boston.
B)New York.
C)Chicago.
D)Atlanta.

Question 36

Roughly what percentage of American Hispanics identify themselves as blacks?

A)2
B)13
C)21
D)43

Question 37

In 2000,blacks represented what percentage of the total American population?

A)7
B)13
C)29
D)27

Question 38

Which of the following statements about black American settlement patterns is MOST accurate?

A)Unlike African immigrants,Afro-Caribbean immigrants usually assimilate into existing African-American communities.
B)African immigrants are more likely than other blacks to settle in urban areas.
C)African immigrants are more likely than other blacks to settle in predominantly or historically white areas.
D)Unlike Afro-Caribbean immigrants,African immigrants usually assimilate into existing African-American communities.

Question 39

In what state was President Barack Obama born?

A)Illinois
B)California
C)Florida
D)Hawaii

Question 40

Which of the following statements about Afro-Caribbeans,African immigrants,and African Americans is MOST accurate?

A)Afro-Caribbeans are more likely than members of other black groups to be college educated.
B)African immigrants are more likely than members of other black groups to be college educated.
C)African Americans are more likely to earn greater median incomes than Africans or Afro-Caribbeans.
D)African Americans are more likely to be found working in service positions such as nursing than are Africans or Afro-Caribbeans.