People
What American linguist developed the theory of Universal Grammar and the concept of "Universal Grammar"?
Noam Chomsky
"What English king is famous for having six wives, two of whom were beheaded?"
King Henry VIII
What Old English epic poem, surviving in a single manuscript, follows a Scandinavian hero who battles the monster Grendel and Grendel's mother?
Beowulf
What is the largest English-speaking country in the world by population?
The United States of America
"His ambiguous answer left everyone confused about his real stance." What does "ambiguous" mean?
Open to multiple interpretations, unclear
What American linguist developed the Input Hypothesis and the concept of "comprehensible input" in second language acquisition?
Stephen Krashen
What English queen's reign is called the "Golden Age" of English literature (Shakespeare's era)?
Queen Elizabeth I
What Gothic novel, written by Mary Shelley, tells the story of a scientist who creates a living creature from dead body parts?
Frankenstein
What country, located south of the United States, is the second-most populous English-speaking country in North America?
Canada
What word describes the use of words that imitate the sound they represent, like "buzz" or "hiss"?
Onomatopoeia
What Swiss linguist's posthumously published lectures introduced the concepts of langue and parole?
Ferdinand de Saussure
The Black Death is a 14th-century pandemic, which wiped out roughly a third of Europe's population, caused a labor shortage that helped English replace French as the dominant language among the English upper classes.
What is another term for The Black Death?
Bubonic Plague
What Italian city is the setting for Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet?
Verona
What city is considered the birthplace of the English language and home to Shakespeare's Globe Theatre?
London
In the sentence "The professor's verbose explanation confused more than it clarified," what does verbose mean?
Wordy / Using more words than necessary
What American linguist pioneered sociolinguistics through his study of language variation, notably in his New York City department store study?
William Labov
What document, signed by King John in 1215, limited the power of English kings?
The Magna Carta
What Southern Gothic novel by Harper Lee follows a small-town lawyer defending a Black man falsely accused of rape?
To Kill a Mockingbird
What US state, home to Mark Twain, is the setting for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn along the Mississippi River?
Missouri
What is the correct term for words like "their," "there," and "they're" that sound alike but have different meanings/spellings?
Homophones
What Bulgarian-French philosopher and literary theorist coined the term "intertextuality"?
Julia Kristeva
What war between England and France, lasting from 1337 to 1453, contributed to English replacing French as the language of the English nobility and government?
The Hundred Years' War
What Modernist novel by James Joyce, structured to parallel Homer's Odyssey, follows a single day in Dublin through the character Leopold Bloom?
Ulysses
What African country, a former British colony, has the largest population in Africa and English as its official language?
Nigeria
"The author's depiction of the aristocracy is distinctly sybaritic." What does "sybaritic" mean?
devoted to luxury, comfort, pleasure, and indulgence, especially to an excessive degree.