As these 15 quirky questions indicate, About Grammar & Composition covers a wide range of topics related to the English language. Take a few minutes to test your knowledge of English and then begin exploring this website. You'll find the answers on page two.
 

1. Roughly what proportion of the world's population is fluent or competent in English?
   (a) one person in a thousand (b) one in a hundred (c) one in ten (d) one in four

1. Which country contains the largest English-speaking population in the world?
   (a) England (b) the United States (c) China (d) India (e) Australia
2. In approximately how many countries does the English language have official or special status?
   (a) 10 (b) 15 (c) 35 (d) 50 (e) 75
3. Which of the following is probably the most widely used English word throughout the world?
   (a) dollar (b) okay (c) Internet (d) sex (e) movie
4. According to rhetorician I.A. Richards, a proponent of the simplified language known as Basic English, "Even with so small a word list and so simple a structure it is possible to say in Basic English anything needed for the general purpose of everyday existence." How many words are in the lexicon of Basic English?
   (a) 450 (b) 850 (c) 1,450 (d) 2,450 (e) 4,550
5. The English language is conventionally divided into three historical periods. In which of these periods did William Shakespeare write his plays?
   (a) Old English (b) Middle English (c) Modern English
6. Which of the following is the longest word that appears in a play by William Shakespeare?
   (a) honorificabilitudinitatibus
   (b) sesquipedalian
   (c) antidisestablishmentarianism
   (d) disproportionableness
   (e) incomprehensibleness

1. An acronym is a word formed from the initial letters of a name. An eponym is a word derived from the proper name of a person or place. What term is used for a word that's derived from the same root as another word?
   (a) retronym (b) oronym (c) paronym (d) exonym
2. Which one of the following words is an example of an isogram?
   (a) destruction (b) racecar (c) sesquipedalian (d) buffet (e) palindrome
3. Which one of the following observations applies to the word typewriter?
   (a) It's the longest word that is typed with only the left hand.
   (b) It's a palindrome.
   (c) It appeared in Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language--several decades before the invention of the first typing machine.
   (d) It's the only word in English that doesn't rhyme with any other word.
   (e) It can be typed using only the top row of keys on a standard keyboard.
4. Which of the following is generally regarded as the first genuinedictionary in English?
   (a) The Elementarie, by Richard Mulcaster
   (b) A Table Alphabeticall, by Robert Cawdrey
   (c) Glossographia, by Thomas Blount
   (d) Dictionary of the English Language, by Samuel Johnson
   (e) An American Dictionary of the English Language, by Noah Webster
5. Which of the following was Noah Webster'sbest-selling book or pamphlet?
   (a) A Grammatical Institute of the English Language (popularly known as the "Blue-Backed Speller")
   (b) Compendious Dictionary of the English Language
   (c) a booklet on global warming titled "Are Our Winters Getting Warmer?"
   (d) An American Dictionary of the English Language
   (e) a revision of the King James Bible
6. The sentence "Natsaha is a friend of Joan's and a client of Marlowe's" contains two examples of which grammatical structure?
   (a) double comparative (b) double entendre (c) double genitive (d) double negative (e) double superlative
7. What was novelist David Foster Wallace's name for "a really extreme usage fanatic"--someone "who knows what dysphemism means and doesn't mind letting you know it"?
   (a) grammaticaster (b) purist (c) SNOOT (d) language maven (e) prescriptivist
8. Which of the following terms refers to the substitution of a more offensive word or phrase for one considered less offensive?
   (a) dysphemism (b) euphemism (c) dramatism (d) orthophemism (e) neologism

Answers to the quiz are on page two.

Also see: A Pop Quiz for Word Lovers