#11 - Specific Reference, Must Be True, Author’s Perspective

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

The correct answer choice is (E).

Answer choice (A):

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C):

Answer choice (D):

Answer choice (E):

This explanation is still in progress. Please post any questions below!

[sbose]

Hi! I was between B and E for this question and ended up choosing B while taking the test. I understand why E was correct but why is B wrong?

Since the criticism was from 16th/17th century Europe and being applied to the picaro, I thought it would be reasonable to think that it had nothing to do with the Native American trickster. Also, the author puts trickster in quotes and I thought that implied that the critics were just using the word trickster but were not referring to the Native American character.

Thank you in advance for your help!

[Robert Carroll]

sbose,

That it has "nothing to do" with the Native American trickster character is not a modest inference, but a very extreme statement. The very fact that the author doesn't talk about it is why we can't infer it - it's at least possible that those using the term "trickster" for a European character trope are at least aware of the Native American mythological trope, and perhaps they are using the term in part in view of an analogy between the two tropes. I don't have any particularly good reason for thinking that's true, but that's the thing - in order to select answer choice (B), we have to know there's no such connection.

Further, note that the criticism is not from the 16th or 17th centuries. The criticism is of literature produced in that time period, but that criticism itself is recent, as the second sentence says.

Robert Carroll

[Tajadas]

sbose,

That it has "nothing to do" with the Native American trickster character is not a modest inference, but a very extreme statement. The very fact that the author doesn't talk about it is why we can't infer it - it's at least possible that those using the term "trickster" for a European character trope are at least aware of the Native American mythological trope, and perhaps they are using the term in part in view of an analogy between the two tropes. I don't have any particularly good reason for thinking that's true, but that's the thing - in order to select answer choice (B), we have to know there's no such connection.

Further, note that the criticism is not from the 16th or 17th centuries. The criticism is of literature produced in that time period, but that criticism itself is recent, as the second sentence says.

Robert Carroll

I have the opposite issue. I know why B is wrong now, but can't the same thing be said for E? I eliminated E because I didn't think there wasn't enough evidence to support the idea that European literature critics were aware of the trickster stories. I shouldn't have assumed that meant the two had nothing to do with each other, but why is it OK to assume the incomplete understanding?

[Adam Tyson]

We can support answer E with the first sentence of the second paragraph, Tajadas, where the author says "Yet closer examination reveals that applying the term “trickster” to both characters obscures essential differences between them." That's the author's opinion that the critics discussed in the first paragraph were making a mistake. A good prephrase for what the author would likely say about that criticism would be "it was incorrect to use that term in that way." So while we cannot prove that the critics had an incomplete understanding, it is a claim with which our author would likely agree.

[HIsleim2001]

I got this question right but I was in between C and D. Can someone explain why those are not right

[Adam Tyson]

Answer C is incorrect, HIsleim2001, because the criticism is not "at odds with" anything. That's another way of saying there is a conflict or contradiction between two positions. The author isn't saying there is a conflict, but just a misunderstanding or misapplication of an idea. "At odds" is a lot stronger than what the author is conveying.

Answer D is incorrect because the passage doesn't suggest anything about what the critics are attempting to do, but just that their analysis is perhaps too simplistic and overlooks important distinctions between picaro and trickster. You might even say that the criticism is imprecise, rather than too making an attempt to be precise, because it is lumping too things together based on superficial similarities.

[lsatquestions]

I eliminated E because of "incomplete understanding" as well. I understood the critics to misuse the term based on a different interpretation rather than incomplete understanding. Please clarify.

[Adam Tyson]

The author starts by telling us that the two characters do have some things in common, but goes on to say that some criticism that has used the terms interchangeably has obscured important differences between them. That suggests that the critics were too focused on the superficial similarities, which would be an incomplete understanding. They got some aspects right, but overall missed the mark.