These questions cover all the usual fields of academic knowledge and are taken from a book entitled A Dictionary of Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs To Know From time to time, I will add additional similar quizzes to the website. The best way to answer this quiz is to write your answers on a piece of paper and when you are through answering the quiz items, check the answers from the link at the bottom of this page.
1. Name the city and country to which one would travel to see the ruins of the Parthenon atop the Acropolis.
2. The oldest city in the United States is in Florida and was founded by the Spanish in the 16th Century. Name that city.
3. Although published in 1936, a book named How to Win Friends and Influence People has sold and is still selling millions of copies. Who wrote that book?
4. The acronym ESP comes from the field of parapsychology. What does ESP stand for?
5. In Karl Marx's economic theory society is divided into the proletariat and the bourgeosie. Define proletariat.
6. Give me the Fahrenheit temperatures for (a) the boiling point of water and (b) the freezing point of water.
7. What do geologists usually call the melted rock located deep within the earth?
8. What is the term commonly used to refer to a descendant which is genetically identical to its immediate ancestor?
9. Cystic fibrosis affects which of the following organs most directly -- the brain? the lungs? the liver? or the colon?
10. How many bytes of information are there in a gigabyte?
11. Here's a Biblical analogy. Samson is to Delilah as David is to which of the following -- Eve? Jezebel? Bathsheba? or Esther?
12. In classical mythology the Styx is which of the following rivers -- the river on Mount Olympus? the river from Rome to Athens? the river that runs through the city of Troy? or the river that separates Hades (the world of the dead) from the world of the living?
13. According to Thomas Edison, genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent what?
14. People were really upset when they found out that the pastor whom we had trusted had feet of clay and was feathering his own nest with resources from the church. What did the pastor do? and why?
15. Name the great 19th Century Russian author who wrote Crime and Punishment.
16. In which of Shakespeare's famous plays do three witches repeatedly chant "double, double toil and trouble"?
17. What is the common term for a language such as Latin or Sanskrit which is no longer spoken but which is still studied by large numbers of people because of its historical or literary importance?
18. Actress Drew Barrymore is a descendant of the famous family of American actors which first became well-known when two brothers and a sister dominated the stage and the screen in the early years of the 20th Century. Name any two of those original famous Barrymores.
19. Name the famous ancient Greek orator who overcame his childhood stuttering by practicing public speaking with his mouth full of pebbles.
20. Name the modern nation which was founded in 1948 and which had as its first Prime Minister a man named David ben Gurion.
21. Name the Yankee sailor at the Battle of Mobile Bay who, when warned of torpedo mines ahead, supposedly cried out "Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead!"
22. During the Vietnam War, what was the name of the capital city of South Vietnam?
23. An antisemitic person is which of the following -- against artificial insemination? against cloning? against Roman Catholics? or against Jews?
24. The CIA is a famous agency of the U.S. government. What does CIA stand for?
25. Name the second-largest continent on earth.