Practice Test - Sahlins and the Original Affluent Society
Practice test on Sahlins's main argument, concepts, and implications in the indexed Week 2 reading.
5 questions · pass mark 50% · try 5 free
1 According to Sahlins, what best defines an affluent society?
- One with the most advanced technology
- One in which all people's wants are easily satisfied
- One with large stores of food surplus
- One with strict labor specialization
Sahlins defines affluence in relation to the ease with which wants are satisfied, not by wealth, technology, or surplus alone.
2 Sahlins's argument supported the older stereotype that hunter-gatherers were inevitably miserable and deprived.
- True
- False
The thesis challenged that stereotype by arguing that hunter-gatherers could satisfy needs with comparative ease.
3 Which publication is identified as the expanded version of Sahlins's affluent society argument?
- Man the Hunter
- Stone Age Economics
- The Journal of Anthropological Research
- Les Temps Modernes critique
The reading identifies Stone Age Economics (1972) as the expanded and especially influential version of the argument.
4 Which ideas are associated with Sahlins's affluent society thesis?
Select all that apply
- Affluence can come from wanting less
- Hunter-gatherers must accumulate large surpluses
- Subsistence work may be intermittent
- Progress always increases leisure
The thesis links affluence to limited wants and often-cited claims of intermittent subsistence work, not large surpluses or guaranteed increased leisure through progress.
5 What broad claim about development appears in the reading alongside Sahlins's thesis?
- Development eliminates labor
- Development increases work per capita and reduces leisure
- Development has no effect on time use
- Development returns societies to foraging
The reading links the thesis to the provocative claim that cultural development may increase work and reduce leisure.