Q16

[cyruswhittaker]

Can you explain why C is correct rather than choice B?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT2]

(B) is a very attractive answer, especially because of the match w/the word "thematic" in the passage. However, note that Kingston uses these personally remembered stories to CREATE something that is thematically organized -- they are not thematically organized to begin with. Instead, what we know is that the personal memories are somewhat unique, and (C) represents this idea correctly.

[panman36]

I thought "B" was wrong for a much more obvious reason: these "personally remembered stories" have nothing to do with "one's own past" as "B" states. Rather these are stories told by others in the oral tradition, which the author has memories of.

[leroyjenkins]

Hmm...I think panman36's point seems reasonable, but is actually unsupported. The stories may, or may not, have to do with "one's own past." I don't think we can draw a solid conclusion one way or the other, given what is in the text. Since we should focus on what we do know for sure, I don't think such speculation is more valuable than the part of the answer that talks about thematic organization.

[amil91]

I got this question correct, but did not eliminate A. To me A didn't 'feel' good but that is not a good reason to not choose something. Anyone able to help me pinpoint specifically why A is a bad choice?

[christine.defenbaugh]

amil91, you're 100% correct that you can't really rely on 'feel' for sorting answer choices! While your instinct lead you down the right path here, it is critical to know why!

(A) is wrong because we don't know that these stories are told in the first person. While the passage focuses a great deal on the personal, unique elements, that may or may not translate to a literal first-person perspective (using "I" or "we" syntax).




As for (B), panman36 and leoangelakos are both correct!

The issue about "thematic" and the issue regarding "one's own past" are both excellent reasons for eliminating (B)! We could argue about which one is 'better', but the fact is that they would both be enough to kill that answer choice all by themselves.

"thematic" is used in the passage to describe Kingston's memory processes, and how they differ from a print-oriented memory process (memorization of precise sequences of words). There's actually no indication that the narrative itself, either in the original telling or in Kingston's retelling, is still thematically organized.

"one's own past" is problematic in a different way. While leoangelakos is correct that we can't absolutely say the stories are not about Kingston's own past, there's also zero indication that they are, which makes referring to them as such definitively wrong.


I hope this helps clear this question up a bit!

[asafezrati]

I chose correctly by eliminating the bad ones, but I don't get get the correct answer.

Can we translate "personally" to "partially idiosyncratic"?

Doesn't seem right.

[maria487]

I chose correctly by eliminating the bad ones, but I don't get get the correct answer.

Can we translate "personally" to "partially idiosyncratic"?

Doesn't seem right.

I think it's much easier to see why this answer is correct in context. At first, I was similarly confused because I could find no other mention of anything related to "personally remembered stories", but then I focused on context--the sentence in which the phrase can be found. The sentence is comparative: it compares Kingston's process to that of print culture's process. In this context, the meaning of the phrase becomes clearer because if the sentence is comparative, we know that what is being compared in A won't correspond to B. So, we know that print culture emphasizes precise sequence; so we then infer that Kington's "thematic" storytelling memory processes (which is described then in lines 31-32 with the phrase "personally remembered stories") will not have this quality of precision. Hence, they are "partially idiosyncratic" rather than precise.

[renata.gomez]

I'm not sure if this is going to help anyone, but what tripped me up on this question the first time around was that I equated personally remembered stories with personally remembered experiences.

With this faulty reasoning, choices A and B looked more tempting because I was looking for something that made them unique to that individual person because they had to " personally experience" the story that they were telling. However, that runs counter to the description right before, that she's "one in a long line of performers".