SOC 3350 MIDTERM EXAM STUDY GUIDE SUMMER 2009
FORMAT:
Part 1: 45 multiple choice questions worth 2 points each. 5-10 of these questions will be taken from the parts of the readings that we did not discuss in class. Sample questions are included below. For the questions drawn from just from parts of the reading, you should go through each chapter in the book and a) identify any major issues or key topics that we did not discuss in class; b) make a list of these; and c) study this list as you would your notes from lecture. The exam will cover chapters 1through 5. To give you an example, in Chapter 1 in the section on “Changes in the Land”, we did not talk about where most people in Latin America live, the changes in the Ecuadorean rainforest, or CVRD’s environmental impacts on the Brazilian Amazon.
Part 2: One essay questions that I will choose from the following two possible questions, with the essay question worth 10 points. You should outline your answer to each possible question before the exam and memorize your outline; you will not be allowed to use notes during the exam. Make sure to incorporate information from the lectures, readings, and videos into your answers, as well as any other information that you feel is relevant. Your answer to each of the parts of these questions (a, b, c, etc.) should be of approximately equal length, and the total length of your answer to the essay question on the exam should be about 1-2 handwritten pages.
1. Compare and contrast the impacts of European colonialism on the indigenous peoples of Hispaniola and on the indigenous peoples in ONE of the following areas: the Amazon, the Peruvian Andes, or the Maya region of Mexico.
a) How did European colonialism affect the indigenous peoples of Hispaniola?
b) How did European colonialism affect the indigenous peoples of your chosen area?
c) What are the similarities between the effects on the two regions?
d) What are the differences between the effects on the two regions?
e) How would you explain these differences?
2. Compare and contrast the evolution of politics in Argentina and Brazil from the colonial period until today.
a) What are the main characteristics of the evolution of politics in Argentina over time?
b) What are the main characteristics of the evolution of politics in Brazil over time?
c) What are the similarities? What are the causes of these similarities?
d) What are the differences? What are the causes of these differences?
Sample Multiple Choice Questions:
1. Portugal conquered _______ during the 1500s.
a. Brazil b. Mexico c. Argentina d. Peru
2. The term “Latin America” was devised by:
a. U.S. President James Monroe. b. a French geographer.
c. Fidel Castro. d. Argentina’s President Rosas.
3. By 1952, _________ was Argentina’s biggest “private” enterprise.
a. the railroad b. the Eva Peron Foundation c. the Rosas cattle ranch d. ITT
4. The video “Aguirre, the Wrath of God” illustrated:
a. the impacts of bureaucratic authoritarianism in Argentina.
b. the impacts of bureaucratic authoritarianism in Brazil.
c. the difficult natural conditions confronting European efforts to conquer the Amazon.
d. the efforts of the Spanish to conquer the Maya in the Yucatan region of Mexico.
5. In the Amazon before the arrival of the Europeans, most of the indigenous peoples relied on:
a. slash and burn agriculture for food. b. agriculture in the floodplains.
c. gold mining to buy food via long distance trading networks. d. agriculture on terraces on the ridges.
6. The squatter settlements called callampas in Chile typically begin by:
a. the government expropriating land from a large landowner and opening it for occupation by the poor.
b. a ritualized seizure of a vacant suburban lot by recent migrants and homeless workers.
c. unemployed farm workers who occupy a piece of land belonging to a large landowner to set up their own small farms.
d. workers in maquiladoras who take over land near the factory to build shacks to provide shelter for themselves.
7. Before the Cuban Revolution, the largest investors in Cuba were:
a. the Soviet Union. b. U.S. businesses. c. British businesses. d. the Spanish Empire.
8. Necessary conditions for the success of neoliberalism include all of the following EXCEPT:
a. at least some benefits must become apparent in the short term to generate enough support to outweigh the social costs.
b. political control by the military to keep politicians from corrupting these development efforts.
c. some raw material or crop in demand globally or lots of low cost labor to sell.
d. positive global economic conditions to provide markets for exports and foreign capital for investment.
9. The Pinochet government lost power after:
a. a military coup led by military officers representing the landed elite.
b. a revolution led by Fidel Castro.
c. a vote on whether he should continue as president resulted in a majority voting no.
d. the Great Depression led to a dramatic decline in exports.
10. Bolivia was conquered by Spain the 1500s and exported thousands of tons of silver to Spain during the colonial era. After Bolivia became independent, large deposits of tin were discovered and developed by a British mining company for exporting tin to Great Britain. Despite this natural resource wealth and millions of dollars in annual export revenues from these minerals, the nation of Bolivia and its people remain some of the poorest in the world. This is an example of all of the following EXCEPT:
a. underdevelopment. b. imperialism. c. the impacts of ISI. d. the impacts of the conquest on Latin America.
11. The most important threat to the nations of Europe during the 1400s and 1500s was:
a. the Islamic empire. b. the Inca empire.
c. diseases imported from Latin America. d. the Russian empire.
12. Agricultural systems in Latin America during the colonial period included all of the following EXCEPT:
a. large numbers of small farmers. b. sugar production for export.
c. food production for mines. d. the use of African slaves for labor.
13. In the Malvinas/Falklands war:
a. Argentina was defeated by Great Britain. b. Brazil was defeated by Argentina.
c. Spanish Latin America gained independence. d. Che Guevara was killed.
14. The Jesuit missionaries in the Amazon:
a. sought to protect indigenous groups from exploitation.
b. were the only group to find gold during the colonial period.
c. developed large scale coca production to supply the miners in the region.
d. used indigenous labor to develop large sugar plantations that made them the wealthiest religious organization in Europe.
15. ________ were defined as the leaders of kinship groups in the Peruvian Andes who allocated labor and goods among the members of the group.
a. Kurakas b. Conquistadores c. Encomenderos d. Haciendas
16. ____________ is defined as economic progress measured either by economic growth or in social terms of the overall well-being of the population.
a. Development b. Underdevelopment c. Imperialism d. Bureaucratic authoritarianism
17. The rival models of politics and development in the 1930s included all of the following EXCEPT:
a. the welfare state and the labor-capital accord. b. fascism.
c. bureaucratic authoritarianism. d. state socialism.
18. When the Brazilian military took power in 1964, they sought to resolve the country’s economic and political problems by promoting the building of factories to produce airplanes and machinery, exporting raw materials from the Amazon, and reducing workers’ wages. The military government relied on civilian technocrats to manage the economy, and these government officials borrowed billions of dollars to finance these efforts. This is an example of all of the following EXCEPT:
a. export-led development. b. bureaucratic authoritarianism.
c. capital goods industrialization. d. caudillismo.
19. ______ was the first colonial laboratory in which the characteristic institutions of Spanish Empire were tried and tested, modified and adapted to the special conditions of the New World.
a. Hispaniola b. Cuba c. Mexico d. Peru
20. The Haitian social revolution was important for Latin America and the world because it was the first revolution:
a. to replace an imperial power with a member of a European royal family as the new monarch.
b. in which slaves defeated a European imperial power and gained their freedom.
c. to replace one imperial power with another imperial power
d. in which a European imperial power was replaced with a democratic government.
21. Impacts of the discovery of large deposits of gold, silver and mercury in the Peruvian Andes on the indigenous peoples of the region included all of the following EXCEPT:
a. many Indians became laborers in these mines.
b. many Indians became entrepreneurs.
c. some Indians offered a massive bribe to the Spanish king.
d. the indigenous population of the region was completely wiped out by difficult working conditions in the mines.
22. The limits on ISI-based growth in Latin America included all of the following EXCEPT:
a. the small size of most domestic markets.
b. the lack of natural resources to supply industry.
c. inability to compete with much larger core firms.
d. the high cost of government subsidization of firms and consumption
23. Most of the wheat, corn and flax grown in Argentina in the late 1800s and early 1900s:
a. was exported to the United States. b. was exported to France.
c. was used as cattle feed. d. was grown by immigrant tenant farmers.
24. The key to Maya agricultural technology between 1,000 BC and 400 AD that allowed the development of large cities was:
a. slash and burn agriculture. b. the use of nitrate as fertilizer. c. cattle ranching. d. raised fields.
25. After Argentina became independent, the new constitution called for democratic elections and the protection of individual rights. However, when small business owners and workers on ranches owned by large landowners pushed for their rights under the constitution, the large landowners supported a coup led by a regional military leader that restored the political control of the large landowners and ended democracy. This is an example of all of the following EXCEPT:
a. caudillismo. b. the new nations of Latin America modeling their laws after France.
c. imperialism. d. legacies of the colonial era.
26. In the video “Americas: The Garden of Forking Paths”, one relationship between Argentina and Great Britain was
a. Great Britain had conquered Argentina during the early 1800s and made it a British colony.
b. Great Britain became the largest buyer of Argentinian manufactured exports in the late 1800s.
c. the son of the British king was appointed the king of Argentina after Argentina became independent.
d. British investment built Argentina’s railroads.
27. The reasons why Europeans were able to conquer Latin America included all of the following EXCEPT:
a. alliances with rival indigenous groups. b. the impacts of European diseases.
c. horses. d. large armies composed mainly of African slaves.
28. During the 1500s, _________
conquered Brazil.
a. Portugal b. Spain c.
Great Britain d. the Ottoman Empire
29. ___________ is defined as a
process of exploitation of a periphery by a core nation that benefits
the core
nation's economic growth but leaves the periphery with a legacy of
inequality, lost resources, political instability,
and environmental degradation that makes future development very
difficult to achieve.
a. Satellitization b. Peripheralization c.
Imperialism d. Underdevelopment
30. The Latin American colonies of __________ rebelled during the 1810s and 1820s and won independence.
a. Portugal b. Great Britain c. France d. Spain
31. _________ is defined as producing consumer durables like cars and airplanes and the machinery and other inputs used in factories.
a. Capital goods industrialization b. Development
c. Import-substitution industrialization d. Neocolonialism
32. __________ replaced Spain as the
major investor and trading partner in Latin America after most Latin
American nations became independent in the early 1800s.
a. The U.S. b. Great Britain c. France d. The Dutch
33. ____________ is economic progress
measured either by economic growth or in social terms of the overall
well-being of the population.
a. Development b. Metropolitanization c.
Urbanization d. Underdevelopment
34. Most of the land in Latin America
during the colonial period from the 1500s through the 1820s:
a. was owned by large landowners.
b. was owned by small farmers.
c. was used to produce food to feed Latin America's growing population.
d. was owned by the Catholic Church.
35. After independence in the 1820s,
the nations of Latin America:
a. soon became wealthy and developed like Western Europe and the U.S.
b. modeled their laws after France and the U.S.
c. created socialist governments that took land away from large
landowners and gave it to the poor.
d. imported slaves from Asia for labor.
36. ________ conquered most of what
later became the nations of Latin America during the 1500s.
a. Britain b. France c.
Spain d. Portugal
37. For the nations of Latin America,
the obstacles to becoming wealthy and industrialized by following the
models of Europe and the U.S. include all of the following EXCEPT:
a. the core was never underdeveloped, only undeveloped.
b. underdevelopment.
c. the legacies of colonialism.
d. difficult natural characteristics made it impossible to effectively
implement development plans in every nation.
38. Reasons why Europe was able to become the wealthiest, most powerful region in the world by the 1800s include all of the following EXCEPT:
a. underdevelopment of the periphery. b. colonialism.
c. the slave trade. d. the core was never undeveloped.
39. The Brazilian military
government's export-led development efforts included all of the
following EXCEPT:
a. promoting capital goods industrialization.
b. increasing workers' wages so that they could buy Brazilian made
industrial products.
c. building large projects in the Amazon to mine, process and export
raw materials to the core.
d. using TNC investment and foreign loans to pay for these development
efforts.
40. After Venezuela became independent, the country's new constitution was based on democratic principles of voting for the president and members of Congress. In the nation's first elections after independence, however, the large landowners did not permit small business owners, craftsmen, and other free workers (people who were not slaves) to vote. When a group of small business owners, craftsmen, and free workers organized an armed rebellion, the commanding general of the Venezuelan army had the rebels hung and declared himself president, stating that the country was not yet ready to be a democracy. This is an example of all of the following EXCEPT:
a. the new nations of Latin America modeled their laws after France.
b. the role of race and ethnicity in Latin America.
c. underdevelopment.
d. the role of the military in politics in Latin America.
41. Peru, a nation in Latin America,
produced thousands of tons of silver and gold during the colonial era
that were
exported to Spain. This led to Peru:
a. being able to successfully promote import-substitution
industrialization, since its earnings from exports could
pay for importing machines for factories.
b. becoming one of the most underdeveloped nations in the world because
of these close ties to the core.
c. having a high degree of equality because of the high value of these
exports.
d. becoming a core nation.
ANSWER KEY
1. A
2. B
3. B
4. C
5. B
6. B
7. B
<>8. B9. C
10. C
11. A
12. A
13. A
14. A
15. A
16. A
17. C
18. D
19. A
20. B
21. D
22. B
23. D
24. D
25. C
26. D
27. D
28. A
29. D
30. D
31. A
32. B
33. A
34. A
35. B
36. C
37. D
38. D
39. B
40. B
41. B