Culture watch

The Asheville IQ Test

How well do you know your city’s culture? How hip are you to the local lingo? Are you down with the arts and music scene? And, more importantly, how do you fare on standardized testing? Take the quiz below to find out. Answers are given at the bottom of the page, with a quick assessment of how you rank in this giant charter-school playground that we call Asheville.

1) Located at the corner of Church Street and Patton Avenue, the Drhumor Building’s name is pronounced more or less like:
A) “doctor humor”
B) “drome-or”
C) “drew-more”
D) “drummer”
E) None of the above

2) Complete the following analogy: “A didgeridoo is to a djembe as” …
A) a glockenspiel is to a banjo
B) a musical saw is to a Hammond B-3
C) an oboe is to a timpani
D) a steel drum is to a steel guitar
E) None of the above

3) Which of the following noted local music groups is not considered a jam band?
A) Stephanie’s Id
B) MarsupiaL
C) Fifth House
D) SeepeopleS
E) None of the above

4) Which of the following local companies doesn’t qualify as one of Asheville’s so-called “creative industries”?
A) Thomas Wolfe House
B) Honeypot Boutique
C) Asheville Contemporary Dance Theatre
D) Yurko Design & Architecture
E) None of the above

5) Who of the following famous local residents is not buried in Asheville’s Riverside Cemetery?
A) O. Henry
B) Zebulon Vance
C) Zelda Fitzgerald
D) Thomas Wolfe
E) None of the above

6) Strictly speaking, which of the following dietary cliques would not eat a peanut-butter-and-honey sandwich?
A) Vegetarian
B) Macrobiotic
C) Vegan
D) Flexitarian
E) None of the above

7) Which of the following does not complete the following analogy: “__________ are to fauxhemians as __________ are to trustafarians.”
A) Vintage T-shirts, new dreadlocks
B) Klimt prints, Bob Marley posters
C) Novelty incense, patchouli oil
D) Loft apartments, crash pads
E) None of the above

Answers …
1: D).
2: C) — Musicologists classify both the didgeridoo and the oboe as aerophones, while both the djembe and timpani are percussion instruments.
3: A) — Stephanie’s Id is generally considered to be a jazz-rock group, and rarely performs songs that last longer than Asheville City Council meetings.
4: A) — Museums and heritage sites are considered to be part of the “cultural industry.”
5: C) — Although she died in a fire in Asheville’s Highland Mental Hospital, Zelda and husband F. Scott Fitzgerald are buried at St. Mary’s Cemetery in Rockville, Md.
6: C) — An animal product, honey is way off-limits to vegans.
7: E).

Correct Answers:
1-2: Gentrifier, you have much to learn.
3-5: Townie.
6-7: Old-School Downtowner.