by christine.defenbaugh Tue Sep 30, 2014 12:49 pm
Great question phil.ogea!
You're getting caught in a common danger loop of hairsplitting. This is a really common trap to fall into after you've been working on the LSAT for a while - you've been training yourself to be more and more specific (even arguably pedantic at times!) with language use in order to really zero in on easily missable differences that change the meaning.
However, it is entirely possible to go to far with the specificity. When we engage in hairsplitting, we start focusing on superficial differences in wording, or the tiny difference in nuance between one word and another word that is an essential synonym. If these tiny differences in minor connotation were enough to make answers wrong, for instance, the LSAT would never be allowed to phrase and answer choice in any language but verbatim quotes - and obviously, that's not what's generally going on for the LSAT!
When we get stuck in hairsplitting, it's as if we have blinders on to the larger issues in play. It's the same fundamental problem that people have when they overfocus on one detail in an RC passage - they miss the big picture!
Here, there's no compelling difference between "embraced more fully" and "employed more consistently". It's not identical language, but it's easy to see how an author could use those two phrases interchangeably to express the same essential idea. Consider what it would actually mean for The Awakening to embrace impressionism more fully - it probably means that it uses impressionism more throughout the work!
Now, it's perfectly rational to be wary of that language and want to make sure you can eliminate everything else.
Looking to (A) - you've gotten caught up once again in hairsplitting, this time between the description of the New Women (interlude and parable) and The Awakening (rendering the mind). While those two descriptions are not identical to one another, I'm not at all sure that they provide clear evidence of any significant contrast between the works. Couldn't these both be argued to qualify as "exploring aspects of female consciousness"?
Additionally, in your focus on these two quotes, and the small differences between them, you missed a much more significant quote in lines 51-52: the New Women used impressionism "in an effort to explore hitherto unrecorded aspects of female consciousness". We have clear cut support that the New Women are attempting to explore female consciousness, and that would directly contradict (A)!
It's important to get comfortable with the difference between strong sensitivity to real differences in language meaning, and hairsplitting on superficial mismatches - the latter can blind you to the real differences at play elsewhere!
Please let me know if this helps clear up this issue!