#15 - Global Reference, Must Be True, Principle

[emilysnoddon]

For this question, I narrowed it down to answer choices B and C and could not chose between the two. I ended up choosing answer choice C because of the last sentence in the passage. Can you please explain why C is incorrect and why B is correct?

Any help would be appreciated. Thank you!

[Adam Tyson]

As I see it the last sentence of the passage actually disproves answer C in fairly strong terms. That last sentence, in saying "languages could be preserved in their oral form if a community made every effort to eschew aspects of the majority culture that make this preservation difficult", is saying that you must pay attention to, rather than ignore, the majority culture when deciding how best to preserve an oral language. If the community rejects the majority culture completely, they can preserve the language orally; if the community allows itself to be influenced by the majority culture, then the written method may be preferred. Either way - whether you are rejecting or accepting the majority culture - you have to pay attention to it, rather than ignore it, in order to decide on the appropriate approach. Answer C, in saying that the principle is that you should ignore the influences of the majority culture when deciding on your approach, flies in the face of that idea.

I hope that helped!

[emilysnoddon]

Thanks that helped a lot. I wasn't really paying attention to what ignore truly means and was thinking about it more as rejecting. Thanks again!

[LSAT2018]

I was able to choose B by the process of elimination but can I ask where the support for it is in the passage?

[Adam Tyson]

It's a theme that runs through the entire passage, more than any single line reference, that supports this general principle, LSAT2018, but here are a few snippets that I felt got us there:

Line 20: "methods are devised to present the sequence in ways that will be most useful and appropriate to the culture"

Right after that, listing the problems encountered in writing down an oral language: "One is the difficulty a community may encounter when it attempts to write down elements (particularly the spellings of words) of a language that has been primarily oral for centuries"; then a little later: "There may be many language traditions in a particular community; which one is to be written down and taught?"

and then a little later still: "the lack of standard orthography made sense in the context of the community’s needs."

Paying attention to the needs of the community, rather than just doing whatever the preservationists felt was best based on their own criteria, pervades this passage and is really baked right in to the Main Point, which is about the value of traditional language to the communities that use them.

[lanereuden]

As I see it the last sentence of the passage actually disproves answer C in fairly strong terms. That last sentence, in saying "languages could be preserved in their oral form if a community made every effort to eschew aspects of the majority culture that make this preservation difficult", is saying that you must pay attention to, rather than ignore, the majority culture when deciding how best to preserve an oral language. If the community rejects the majority culture completely, they can preserve the language orally; if the community allows itself to be influenced by the majority culture, then the written method may be preferred. Either way - whether you are rejecting or accepting the majority culture - you have to pay attention to it, rather than ignore it, in order to decide on the appropriate approach. Answer C, in saying that the principle is that you should ignore the influences of the majority culture when deciding on your approach, flies in the face of that idea.

I hope that helped!

What's the difference between ignoring and rejecting then precisely ?

[Erik Shum]

Hi Lane,

I do not want to speak for Adam's use of the terms in his post but I expect he is using "ignore" the same way as it is being used in answer choice (C).

To ignore the majority culture would be to not even consider its potential impact on the preservation of the tribal community's language.

The passage and answer choices don't use the term "reject" but based on my reading of Adam's post, Adam is describing the final paragraph of passage, where a community can "eschew" aspects of the majority culture in order to preserve their language orally rather than in writing. To eschew is to avoid and, in the context of that last paragraph of the passage, it means not to participate in aspects of majority culture (for example, not participating in the economic system of the majority culture and instead living in isolation from it). I think Adam's use of "reject" is entirely appropriate to describe isolation from majority culture.

To ignore is to not consider. To reject/eschew is to acknowledge and deliberately not engage with.

Does that answer your question?

[lanereuden]

Hi Lane,

I do not want to speak for Adam's use of the terms in his post but I expect he is using "ignore" the same way as it is being used in answer choice (C).

To ignore the majority culture would be to not even consider its potential impact on the preservation of the tribal community's language.

The passage and answer choices don't use the term "reject" but based on my reading of Adam's post, Adam is describing the final paragraph of passage, where a community can "eschew" aspects of the majority culture in order to preserve their language orally rather than in writing. To eschew is to avoid and, in the context of that last paragraph of the passage, it means not to participate in aspects of majority culture (for example, not participating in the economic system of the majority culture and instead living in isolation from it). I think Adam's use of "reject" is entirely appropriate to describe isolation from majority culture.

To ignore is to not consider. To reject/eschew is to acknowledge and deliberately not engage with.

Does that answer your question?

Fair enough thanks!