History 342
Devine
Fall 2014
Final Exam Study Guide
The
questions that will appear on the final will be drawn verbatim from the questions below. If you are able to answer these
questions thoroughly, you will be well-prepared. It should be clear which
questions are short answer questions and which are long answer questions.
In
Part one of the midterm, there will 10 short essay questions taken from the
list below; you will answer SEVEN
of them. In Part two, there will be three long essay questions taken from the
list below; you will answer ONE of them.
PLEASE
BRING AN UNMARKED GREEN BOOK TO CLASS.
1.
How did American anticommunism
during the Cold War affect Washington’s policies toward Latin America?
2.
How did American anticommunism during
the Cold War affect the governments of Guatemala and Chile?
3.
What was Operation Condor and what
consequences did it have for several Latin American nations during the Cold
War?
4.
Who was Jacobo
Arbenz and why was he a significant figure in the
history of Guatemala?
6.
What was “Import Substitution
Industrialization”? How did the I.S.I plans propose to build (or rebuild) the economies of
Latin American countries after World War II?
What kept these plans from succeeding?
7.
What was “Neo-liberalism”? What were
the pros and cons of such an economic policy?
8.
Though he was popular with many
Argentines, why did Juan Peron’s economic policies end up hurting the nation over
time?
9.
Choose one Latin American nation
discussed in Mason’s “The Chimera of Progress in Latin America” and indicate what
are the most significant factors that have impeded long lasting economic
prosperity and political stability in that nation.
10.
According
to Slavenka Drakulic, why
was “being a woman” in Eastern Europe a “constant battle against the system?”
11.
How
does Drakulic define “autocensorship?” Why was it an effective weapon of
the state in Eastern Europe?
12.
What
is “the Communist eye?” If we looked at
our own society through “the Communist eye” how would our perceptions change?
13.
Why is Drakulic
ambivalent about whether women should buy fur coats?
14.
What
does Drakulic think of
Western feminists and leftists?
15.
What
does the habit of “collecting” reveal about the Communist system and why it
failed?
16.
Why
do the cities of Communist Europe look so shabby? Who or what is responsible for this?
17.
Who
was Josip Broz Tito? Why was he able to maintain stability in Yugoslavia during
the Cold War and why his death in 1980 significant in that nation’s history?
18.
Why were there tensions between
Josef Stalin and Tito during the early Cold War?
19.
Why was there such instability and
violence in Bosnia during the early 1990s?
20.
Who was Slobodan Milosevic and what
role did he play in the breakup of Yugoslavia during the early 1990s?
21.
What factors accounted for the
political instability and economic backwardness of sub-Saharan Africa during
the Cold War?
22.
Who was Robert Mugabe and why is he
a significant figure in the history of Zimbabwe?
23. How did receiving a western education contribute to the “nervous
conditions” of the characters in Dangarembga’s
novel? [In answering, focus on at least two characters.]
24.
How did the combination of tribal
tradition and British influence create a “nervous condition” for the female
characters in Dangarembga’s
novel? [In answering, focus on at least two characters.]
25.
Why
was the 1953 overthrow of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh
a significant event in Iranian history? How was this event “re-remembered” in
the 1970s to suit a new political agenda?
26.
Why did modernization during the “White
Revolution” in Iran bring both progress and instability?
27.
Why had the Shah lost the backing of
most Iranians by 1979?
28.
How was the Ayatollah Khomeini able
to win widespread support in Iran even though many Iranians did not share his
strict religious views?
29.
Why was the hostage crisis
significant in helping Khomeini to consolidate his power in Iran?
33.
What
are some of the things Jay Gatsby and the Islamic Revolutionaries have in
common? Are both “romantics”? Did both
subscribe to “colossal illusions”? Did both have difficulty distinguishing
imagination from reality? Did both want
to recreate a past that never existed?
34.
Why does Nafisi
condemn “revolutionary” violence and “revolutionary” justice?
35.
Why does Nafisi
believe the Iranian revolution went badly wrong? Who or what does she blame?
40.
How did the Soviets misperceive the
US reaction to Moscow’s invasion of Afghanistan? Why did the Soviet leadership
see Washington’s response as aggressive?
41.
According to Ahmed Rashid, what role
did the CIA play in the Afghan war of 1980-1988? How did the CIA set the stage
for what some analysts have called “blow back”?
42.
According to Milton Bearden and
Ahmed Rashid, what role did Arabs play in the Afghan war and, later, in the
rise of the Taliban?
43.
Why did Saddam Hussein invade Kuwait
in 1990? How had the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988 helped set the stage for this
invasion?
44.
Why did the Gulf War of 1991 stir up
so much anti-American feeling among Arabs and contribute to the emergence of Al
Qaeda?
45.
Though US forces quickly toppled
Saddam Hussein’s regime at the outset of the second Gulf War, why did such a
long insurgency and period of internal strife occur in the aftermath?
46.
What factors led to the civil war in
Syria and the emergence of the Islamic State?