1. What are the characteristics of the totalitarian regime? How does such a regime function, and what are its aims? What sort of ideology does it propagate, and what function does this ideology serve? What totalitarian regimes are a product of the twentieth century?
2. How did Stalin's regime emerge in Russia, and how did fascism rise in Italy and Germany? To what extent do these states exemplify modern totalitarianism?
3. What course of events led to the outbreak of World War II? What was the rationale behind the appeasement policy of Britain and France? How did the war proceed, and what were its decisive moments? How did it end? What were its results?
4. What did Steinbeck contribute to the literature of social justice? What is Brecht's theory of epic theater? With what plays did he try to realize this theory?
5. What authors are best known for their indictments of totalitarianism? What are their most notable works, and how do these attack the totalitarian state?
6. What forms has Holocaust literature taken, and what purpose does this literature serve? Who are the leading Holocaust writers, and for what works are they best known?
7. Who are the major war novelists, and how do their works envision the experience of World War II and its aftermath?
8. For what works are Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison best known? How do those works portray the experience of black people in American society?
9. What effect did the rise of totalitarianism have on the development of European art?
10. How did Modernist art come to the United States? How was it received by the public, and how did American artists respond to it? What did Hopper, O'Keefe, Lange, and Adams contribute to the development of American art?
11. How did the International Style of architecture develop? Who were its leading practitioners, and what were the characteristics of their style?  What was Frank Lloyd Wright's attitude toward the International Style, and how did his style differ from it?
12. What innovations did Holiday introduce into the practice of blues singing? What was Bebop, and who were its leading practitioners?
13. What are the distinguishing features of Bin Band jazz? Who were the major band leaders, and what did they contribute to the form and to the culture at large?
14. What debate was provoked by the rise of totalitarianism and World War II? What questions defined the terms of the debate, and how did intellectuals attempt to answer them?