Q17

[stephen.dewart]

I was 100% lost on this one. Can you help?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Sure. Happy to help.

In the passage Kingston invests the English language with qualities of Chinese language. So English almost appears to be Chinese.

Answer choice (B) has a piece of cotton cloth that is invested with the qualities of wool, so that a piece of cotton cloth almost appears to be woolen. That's the analogy they were looking for on this one.

(A) scraps are pieced together but one is not formed to simulate another.
(C) is mere substitution as opposed to simulation.
(D) is mere substitution as opposed to simulation.
(E) is a combination as opposed to simulation.

Does that help clear this up?

[jennifer]

I did not ask the question in the orginal post, however the response given did not clear anything up for me it seems way too abstract. I still do not understand why B is correct, sorry

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Unfortunately, when you're asked to find an analogous situation, you have to move from one situation through abstraction to another situation. We need to find one situation that is similar to another, and we need to understand what the connecting relationship is.

Kingston's use of English as described in lines 51-55 is invested with characteristics of another language - Chinese.

Answer choice (B) has one cloth invested with characteristics of another type of cloth.

Thus, the situation is analogous. Hope that helps.

[csunnerberg13]

I guess what I'm still confused about is the use of the word "investing". Why does investing mean, as Matt described, mean that the English is REPLACING the Chinese - as in answer choice C where one fabric replaces another. I didn't get the sense that she was replacing Chinese with English at all - it seemed much more like she was mixing the two to have a new effect. That's what answer choice E gives...

[timsportschuetz]

"Investing" can be defined to mean as "imbue" or "infuse". So, the author uses Chinese language and infuses this into the English language. Answer (B) is most analogous to the above relationship. (E) is incorrect because of the comparison in the last part (completely unrelated). However, (E) starts out pretty well... so, I guess it could sound attractive initially and if you don't read the entire answer choice.

[daijob]

Could anyone prvide an example of this situation?
Is it like..."Sushi" in Japanese? (using Japanese word and it becomes English too)

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Not exactly daijob. It's not about a single word or phrase you might be familiar with, but infusing the written ideas, grounded in the literary conventions of one culture, with those of another literary culture. In the case at hand it's blending English, heavy in idiomatic expressions (e.g. "you're driving me up the wall" expresses frustration with someone), with Chinese, heavy in aural and visual puns (i.e. using various meanings of a word or the similarities between how to words sound in a humorous way).

Hope that helps!

[jasonleb1]

Is "qualities" the operative word here? If she were actually combining English and Chinese in a concrete way to create this new form of talk-story, A would be the correct answer. But that's not what she's doing. Rather she's taking English and imbuing it with the qualities of the Chinese language, not the language itself.

I originally chose A and am having a really hard time seeing how B could be the answer any other way.

[maryadkins]

Yeah, (A) is kind of tricky, I agree.

The problem is she's not forming a new language. She's just infusing one language with another. (A) also doesn't involve two things, only one—cotton being used to make a quilt.

[MichaelC134]

I was stuck between (A) and (B). My tie-breaker for choosing (B) was since this is a diversity passage the analogy would more likely be positive which "special process" implies. Is this correct? Thanks.

[WillY221]

I agree, this is one of the more unusual questions (and passages for that matter). I got it wrong the first time while timed, but under review, I broke it down. The trouble I originally had with answer B was the use of the word "simulated." Bizarre question and choices.