Q3

[sujunglee.sj]

Hello everyone,

I eliminated the answers to (A) and (E) and ended up, unfortunately, choosing (A).

I don't see anything technically wrong with (A); can someone please explain why it is incorrect while (E) is correct?

[choabbbung]

Hi,

Let me try this...
I eliminated (A) because the author is simply listing the different forms of structures that the Latina authors have revolutionized. In other words I think the author is giving equal attention to each author, by highlighting how each author uses a technique/structure that is different from the typical autobiography structure: Borderlands is a combo of personal + history, Loving in the War Years doesn't follow the typical chronological arrangement, and lastly, Getting Home Alive brings together the voices of two people.

(A) is saying that author is distinguishing GHA from the two other types of writers, but that's not the primary purpose of introducing GHA. The author is not comparing GHA from the two others but is rather continuing with introducing the books that are experimental with form and structure.

Any other RC gods could help us..

[ohthatpatrick]

You have thoroughly nailed it! Nice work.

RC question stems that have
serves to
in order to
primarily to
are all about the Purpose of a Detail.

I love these questions. I think of them as "Bookend" questions, because the question isn't testing the detail itself, but rather the BIG IDEA that sits before the details or after it.

So you always go looking for a bigger claim before or after that this detail connects to and remind yourself of the overall point/function of that paragraph.

Normally, if we see GHA mentioned in line 35, we would read backwards a sentence or two and find a big idea. Here, the whole 3rd paragraph is full of small ideas / details. There's no hierarchy of "bigger claim, after all supporting detail". These are all supporting details meant to flesh out the big ideas in P2.

P2 gives us the big picture ideas about why these writers are innovative and noteworthy (the main point of the passage):
- mix languages
- politics of multiple cultural identities
and these two big factors manifest in the
- mixed structure

So as the previous poster said, P3 is all about providing examples of what we said in P2.

(A) This is the classic trap answer to a "bookend" question. It tries to get students to pick something that sounds like WHAT was said in the detail, when the question is asking WHY it was said or HOW it connects to bigger ideas. It's true-ish, that the discussion of GHA does provide details about how GHA is different from the other two works discussed. Looking at lines 45-49, you can see how at the end of the paragraph the author is summarizing the paragraph's point by lumping all three of these autobiographies together. So there's no justification for (A)'s notion that the author's purpose is to set GHA apart from the other two.

(B) It's not clear that GHA uses journal entries at all.

(C) No support for "common feature". The three works highlighted all have mixed modes and structure, which set them apart from traditional autobiography. But the "multiple voices" aspect is only mentioned with GHA, and prefaced by saying this book "departs EVEN FURTHER" than the other two. So we can't say that multiple voices is common to Latina autobiography.

(D) The author was never trying to make a big point about the audience having difficulty understanding these writers. This answer is just trying to trap people because it says in 42-43 that "this ordering may seem fragmentary and confusing".

(E) We know that GHA "departs even further from the conventions typical of autobiography" ... meaning that the previous examples ALSO departed from the conventions typical of autobiography. And all of P3 falls under the umbrella of claims made in P2, which ends talking about the "mixed structure" of these works.

(E) is correct.