MIDTERM EXAM # 2
"MIDDLE AGES, RENAISSANCE, REFORMATION, PART II"
COVERS:
Chapters 11, 12, 13, 14 and the Web and your Head
EXAM DETAILS
- The following "take home" consists of essay questions. You select, write using evaluation, thinking, etc. Send in your answers on EMail (do not use attachments), with the Subject Line: 4b Midterm #2.
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Unless excused illness prevails, I do not give either makeup exams or
incompletes. I will try to accommodate your traveling and work schedules
if possible but you will have to let me know immediately. Otherwise, I do
not accept late exams.
I have spent considerable time and thought in trying to craft for you an exam that is challenging, thoughtful, interesting, and fun. It should be fun for you to think about ideas and situations that intrigue you. It should be fun to try to put together what you already know or hunch, what you read, and most important what has fascinated you on the Internet. I wanted you to have the opportunity to:
- Be flexible in terms of the way your mind thinks and your interest.
- Have a range of choices.
- Use whatever you have "stumbled" upon.
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Really focus on YOUR own questions.
ENJOY. AND Reminder to include THINKING AND WONDERING.
THIS EVALUATIVE ESSAY EXAM CONSISTS OF Three PARTS: Two straightforward ESSAYS AND ONE MORE CREATIVE" ESSAY.
Midterm #2 : Essay Questions
Parts I, II, III
ESSAY EXAM PART I AND II (66 Points)
Answer TWO of the following
questions
in a full and conceptual manner. Move
from your facts into concepts and your ideas - and the importance of the
subject. I will be looking for knowledge (read the material, gone through
helpful parts of the Web and and/or seen a movie), your thinking and pondering.
I will not grade on grammar and spelling.
1.
AGE OF
DISCOVERY
Tell me and explain 3 "things" that ENABLED this age (made
it possible).
Tell me and explain 3 "things that CATALYZED this age.
Most important, explain to me at least 5 reasons why all this discovery business
at great human cost and danger and excitement? Why did they do it? The explorers,
the Kings, the nations? Why?
This question is written briefly, but it requires a good deal of thought
and analysis.
2. LIFE IN THE LATER MIDDLE
AGES
In my regular lecture class I said: " It was a time of
war and civil war, revolts in the towns, heresies within the Church. A time
full of bitter conflicts at home and abroad, when men began to take their
fate into their own hands." I also noted: " It is a time of change, of new
economies, new powers, the shaping of a new kind of state, a time of transition,
dynamic. On the other hand, it is also full of the same old horrors: endless
wars, grinding poverty, deadly plagues. You would not want to live there."
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First, identify 4 major "things" that were different than the very early days of Medieval times. -
Then, describe what life was like for humans. -
Then, tell me very briefly what life was like for each of these groups during the late Middle Ages: peasants, merchants, nobles - and women -
Finally, leave out the nobles and pick the one group you would have least liked to be a member of and why.
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3. REFORMATION
In my day class I said: "A great religious revival sparked by a man driven to the edge of despair, an explosion of social unrest and bitter political conflict, together they gave old enemies new battle cries and shook Christendom to its very core."
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Quickly, define the Reformation in its broadest sense. -
What was Martin Luther really thinking about or upset about. How important a figure in human history and why? -
Then, analyze: what kinds of "things" catalyzed it? And to what helped spread it so fast and so far? What was its significance and its results? -
Was the Reformation a fundamentally religious phenomenon or a generally broader development? Quickly, one paragraph -
In no more than 3 sentences, tell me what this means: "The 3 great elements of modern Western civilization coming together: gunpowder, printing and the Protestant religion."
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4. RENAISSANCE.
You are lecturing in a large hall on the
Renaissance.
BE THAT PERSON.
(Use "I" for example). You must put yourself in
it.
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First, you address THE ISSUE: Was the Renaissance the beginning of a new modern world, a world of imagination, action, enterprise; or was it the culmination of the Middle Ages which had lasted for nearly a thousand years; or was it a bit of both? Take a stand and tell your students why you say so. (DO IT) -
BUT when you are finished in your lecture to these almost sleeping students (they are cold and hungry), a student stands up and says, "I think too big a deal was/is made about the Renaissance. There was 'lots of good stuff' that happened in the Middle Ages." -
YOU respond to him with your strong answer which is really a conclusion to your lecture. (DO IT)
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5.CHANGE
Analyze (do not just list) the major changes that occurred between the feudal age beginning and the Renaissance. Be sure you use at least 3 categories such as political, social, economic, living, cities, trade, inventions, etc. Your choice.-
Now, why do you think it took so longggggg to get to the Renaissance? -
What do you think were the 2 most important "things" that had to happen first? Analyze.
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6. SPIRIT OF THE
RENAISSANCE
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a. Which six men do you consider the leading, or most characteristic, intellectual, literary, humanist, and artistic figures of the Renaissance and why? -
b. What was "the so-called spirit of the Renaissance" that they all shared? Be sure to talk about Humanism and the Humanists? -
c. One author referred to the artists by saying: "In the visual arts - they illustrate the vigor and excitement of the time and its focus on human possibilities." Do you agree and why? -
d. Some scholars refer to the people of the Renaissance as the "first modern individuals." Do you agree and why?
ESSAY EXAM PART III (33 points) - TWO CHOICES
7. Pick an area, a subject
in this time period - a subject that you have been "surfing" and thinking
about, that interests or intrigues you. Or an area in which you have
many impressions or a vivid impression from your surfing and reading.
Write your own SUPERB question and then YOUR SUPERB answer it or integrate
your impressions into a thoughtful, analytical or creative SUPERB essay.
If you find yourself answering it in less than TWO full pages, you are on
the wrong track. You are graded as much for your question as your answer.
Last exam, many gave less attention, time, space to this question than
the "non-creative" question. They lost valuable points.
Be sure to treat this question fully and in the same
format as the others - WITH
HEADINGS. If it is not going
to be a SUPERB question and response, then go on and write on
#8.
OR
8. The Two Great
Movements of the 15th and 16th Century - What do you
Think?
"The Renaissance and the Age of Discovery were two peaks
of achievement - One of imagination, the other of action."
I need you to write a serious essay combining thought and examples - either
in the order I have proposed or as a creative whole of your own, but being
sure to cover the issues:
a. These two peaks of achievement, did they have anything
in common? Is it possible to say that Erasmus wrote and Raphael painted,
and Bartholomeu Diaz ventured past the Cape of Storms in obedience to a similar
impulse?
b. And was this impulse derived from the urge to discover new lands and the
intellectual ferment of the Renaissance have any connection? Did the broadening
of geographical horizons have any impact on the mental horizons of the people
at home or the other way around? What about human aspirations?
c. Did the explorers reflect a new Renaissance
mentality?
- PLEASE BE SURE TO INCLUDE THIS FORM IN YOUR RESPONSE OR I WILL NOT
- BE ABLE TO ACCEPT YOUR EXAM.
- NAME:___________________________________________________
- COURSE_________________________________________________
- By sending forward this form, I hereby certify that I have copied absolutely nothing from anywhere unless I have use quotation marks and cited exact sources. I also certify that I have read the article on plagiarism and have been careful with my paraphrasing. I understand that copying will ABSOLUTELY result in immediate, severe consequences and that there is no such thing as legitimately "shoplifting a little" or "copying a little." I also understand that if I fail to send forward this form, my exam will not be accepted. And that understanding what copying or paraphrasing means is my responsibility.