#17 - Global Reference, Must Be True, Author's Perspective

[Adam Tyson]

It is the line at the end of the first paragraph of Passage B that answers all of your questions, Tajadas and ToadKing and appletree.:

But the texts most central to a genre are those texts that were clearly written to exploit a particular protocol—texts that yield a particularly rich reading experience when read according to one protocol rather than another.

This supports answer A, because if the most central works of a genre are those written to exploit a particular protocol, then the borderline cases (not central, but out on the fringe somewhere) would be those that are not written with a particular protocol in mind. Tajadas, is it possible you missed the word "not" in that answer choice?

And this line helps us reject answer B because it start with the word "But," which tells us it is a counterclaim to the previous sentence. Sure, we can read anything however we want, but writing in a certain way to exploit certain reading protocols is what defines a genre, and those protocols are very much about the expectations of the reader and not only what the author wants to create. After all, we are talking about reading protocols, not writing protocols. They are about catering to or interacting with the reader. Science Fiction is therefore written in a way that will show differences between our world and the imagined world in the story because that is what the reader of Sci Fi expects. Poetry will be written with phonic aspects in mind because that is what the reader of poetry expects. The expectations of the reader ARE a guiding force in selecting the reading protocol, which is what determines genre. Thus, answer B is an opposite answer. Pay attention to that "but" to see that shift.

[iannnn555]

I don't know if it is just my weird perspective or the fact that the passage b was written decades ago when the usage of the "fourth wall" as a literary device was not as common, but the first impression I get when I saw the answer A was that it seems to imply "if a fiction was written in exploitation of a certain genre, then there would be rarely any contention of which genre (not borderline cases) because the fiction is probably clear cut in its genre". Which appears false to me because many most prominent works specifically exploit the fact that it is being written like something that it isn't, e.g. mockumentaries, fake diaries, etc. All of which clearly belong to a distinctly different genre they purported to be because of the juxtaposition of the language and the context.

Which just immediately struck me as incorrect, even though the answer itself does not explicitly imply that (it talked about genres not written to exploit reading protocols sometimes being borderline cases, which in strict standards doesn't say anything about the works that are written in a particular genre, but since, if we boil down the answer A, it really just says that not all works that aren't written in a clear cut literary voice are clearly and obviously in a certain genre, which basically is a statement that tells us almost nothing, so it compelled me to draw an extension to what it was trying to imply.

Also, I know that when the answer says "a particular genre, I'm interpreting that as any particular genre, i.e. sometimes in the literary style of a blatantly wrong genre, deliberately. Which, to retrospect, seems to be a bit too specific, however, during the time crunch when I was going over the question, the idea of books that were written deliberately in a wrong style immediately comes to my mind.

Am I thinking too much? Or have I just been reading too many avantgarde books? Or am I just weird?

[Adam Tyson]

A few things to consider here, iannnn555:

1. What makes you think the passage was written decades ago, and why would that even matter? It looks like you are trying to bring in some outside knowledge here, and making unwarranted assumptions about the passage, and these are both big no-nos on the LSAT. The text is your guide - base your answers exclusively on what's there.

2. Are you perhaps misinterpreting the answer choice? It isn't about works that were written to exploit a particular reading protocol (which would be the ones most central to a genre, per the author of passage B), but about ones that were not. That would mean the ones where the author may not have been intentionally placing the work within any one genre. What could a "borderline case" be if not one that is distant from the "most central" cases?

3. Are you losing sight of what the question asked? It's not about what we, the test takers, might agree with, but what the author of Passage B would agree with. You have to eject your viewpoint here and completely adopt their viewpoint. Take what they said and determine what they would think about these answers, not what we think of them.

One last note here, about your analysis of answer A where you said "sometimes in the literary style of a blatantly wrong genre." I think you're imposing your own view here again. Who said anything about a "wrong" genre? What would make any written work right or wrong in this way? All the author is saying is that some works are written deliberately to fit squarely within a particular genre, and some works are not. The former are the ones most central to their genre, and the others are less central, so perhaps "borderline" cases (they may have some elements of one genre and some elements of another, and thus be harder to classify.)

Take a step back and then take another run at this. Leave all that outside knowledge where it belongs - outside. Then, based exclusively on the text, look for the answer that there is at least some reason to believe the author of passage B would say "yeah, I agree with that statement," regardless of whether YOU agree with it or not.

[boondoggle]

Thanks for all the helpful discussion above. I'm still confused about how (A) can be correct. Here's why I eliminated it:

The author of Passage B rejects the "thematic" method of classifying genres of fiction because in it, "[t]he problem of "borderline cases"... arises so often that the definition fails to demarcate genres entirely." The author prefers the "reading protocol" method specifically because it is "more fruitful," i.e. that it defines genres more clearly and lowers the incidence of borderline cases.

We're supposed to accept (A) because Passage B tells us that "the texts most central to a genre are those texts that were clearly written to exploit a particular protocol," which supposedly implies that the texts not most central are borderline cases. But this line of reasoning seems to imply that the "reading protocol" method could entail a very large number of borderline cases (since there cannot be too many "texts most central"). Not only would this view go against the logic of the passage, but it would also contradict the author's own point, making him unlikely to agree with it.

Can anyone tell me why this, specifically, is wrong? Thanks!

[Jeff Wren]

Hi boondoggle,

First, it's important to note that the author of Passage B recommends distinguishing genres based on reading protocols as a better, or "more fruitful" (lines 27-28), alternative to the method based on thematic similarities, but that does not mean that it will eliminate all borderline cases.

All Answer A is stating is that works which were not written to exploit a particular reading protocol will sometimes be borderline cases, which is actually a very modest claim with which the author would very likely agree.

You wrote:

"We're supposed to accept (A) because Passage B tells us that "the texts most central to a genre are those texts that were clearly written to exploit a particular protocol," which supposedly implies that the texts not most central are borderline cases. But this line of reasoning seems to imply that the "reading protocol" method could entail a very large number of borderline cases (since there cannot be too many "texts most central")."

You appear to be making a logical opposition error in your reasoning here. While it is certainly true that borderline cases would not be "the texts most central to a genre," it is not correct to assume that any text that is not "the most central to the genre" is a borderline case. In fact, what is more likely is that the majority of works in a genre are neither "the most central," nor borderline cases. It may be helpful to think of the genre as a "bullseye," with "the most central" works being in the tiny circle in the center of the bullseye and the borderline cases as those along the edge of the outermost circle. Of course, that would leave the bulk of the works of a genre somewhere in the middle, neither "most central," nor borderline.