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- misrapreeti1
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- Joined: Thu Sep 03, 2009 8:08 am
Reading Comprehension - tone of passage
How to know the tone of the passage? What should I be looking for while answering such type of questions?
- RonPurewal
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Re: Reading Comprehension - tone of passage
actually, we've researched the topic of tone further, and discovered that the gmat never actually asks directly for the tone of a passage. as a result, as of last month, we have removed all questions asking directly for the tone of a passage from our cat exams.
the closest they will get is to ask questions that refer obliquely to the tone of the passage, but instead ask something else directly, such as
"the tone of the passage indicates that it is aimed at which of the following audiences?"
or
"the tone of the passage indicates that the speaker would agree with which of the following statements?"
--
in general, there's not going to be a systematic way, that you'll be able to memorize, in which to detect the tone of a passage.
finding the tone of the passage is not unlike finding the tone of a conversation.
spoken conversation is not a particularly good analogy (since the tone of a spoken conversation is largely conveyed by nonverbal gestures and tones of voice, rather than by the words themselves), but a good analogy would be reading conversations between characters in a written piece of literature. when you read such conversations (at least if they are well written), you should be able to tell the "tone" of the conversation -- i.e., the way the characters are feeling about the matter at hand.
clearly, it would be impossible, or at least difficult beyond any reasonable standard, to give a list of memorized ways to determine the tone of a conversation between two literary characters -- you basically have to pretty much "get it".
this would understandably be much more difficult for someone reading a passage in a language other than his or her native language, since "tone" is inevitably going to be affected by many culturally loaded factors.
however, do note that they won't directly ask for the tone itself (as noted above); therefore, you may find questions such as the two listed above somewhat easier to answer.
also, don't forget that this is a test on which it is perfectly ok to miss lots of questions.
if you're reading a passage on which you just don't really "get" the way in which the speaker seems to view the material, then just take a guess on the tone questions and move on. i highly doubt that you would see more than one such question on the exam anyway.
the closest they will get is to ask questions that refer obliquely to the tone of the passage, but instead ask something else directly, such as
"the tone of the passage indicates that it is aimed at which of the following audiences?"
or
"the tone of the passage indicates that the speaker would agree with which of the following statements?"
--
in general, there's not going to be a systematic way, that you'll be able to memorize, in which to detect the tone of a passage.
finding the tone of the passage is not unlike finding the tone of a conversation.
spoken conversation is not a particularly good analogy (since the tone of a spoken conversation is largely conveyed by nonverbal gestures and tones of voice, rather than by the words themselves), but a good analogy would be reading conversations between characters in a written piece of literature. when you read such conversations (at least if they are well written), you should be able to tell the "tone" of the conversation -- i.e., the way the characters are feeling about the matter at hand.
clearly, it would be impossible, or at least difficult beyond any reasonable standard, to give a list of memorized ways to determine the tone of a conversation between two literary characters -- you basically have to pretty much "get it".
this would understandably be much more difficult for someone reading a passage in a language other than his or her native language, since "tone" is inevitably going to be affected by many culturally loaded factors.
however, do note that they won't directly ask for the tone itself (as noted above); therefore, you may find questions such as the two listed above somewhat easier to answer.
also, don't forget that this is a test on which it is perfectly ok to miss lots of questions.
if you're reading a passage on which you just don't really "get" the way in which the speaker seems to view the material, then just take a guess on the tone questions and move on. i highly doubt that you would see more than one such question on the exam anyway.
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