Reading ComprehensionDifficulty: Medium

PT136 S3 P1 Q3 Explanation

Ousmane Sembene

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Passage

Many critics agree that the primary characteristic of Senegalese filmmaker Ousmane Sembène's work is its sociopolitical commitment. Sembène was trained in Moscow in the cinematic methods of socialist realism, and he asserts that his films are not meant to entertain his compatriots, but rather to raise their awareness of the past and that enable him to express his views and to reach both literate and nonliterate Senegalese viewers.

A number of Sembène's characters and motifs can be traced to those found in traditional West African storytelling. The tree, for instance, which in countless West African tales symbolizes knowledge, life, death, and rebirth, is a salient motif in Emitaï. The trickster, usually a dishonest individual who personifies antisocial traits, appears in his trade—he is a street merchant—and by the difficulties he encounters but is unable to overcome.

Moreover, many of Sembène's films derive their structure from West African dilemma tales, the outcomes of which are debated and decided by their audiences. The open-endedness of most of his plots reveals that Sembène similarly leaves it to his viewers to complete his narratives: in such films as Borom Sarret, Mandabi, and by his frequent use of freeze-frames, which carry the suggestion of continued action.

Finally, like many West African oral tales, Sembène's narratives take the form of initiatory journeys that bring about a basic change in the worldview of the protagonist and ultimately, Sembène hopes, in that of the viewer. His films denounce social and political injustice. and his protagonists' social consciousness emerges from an acute oral storytelling more than, as many critics have supposed, to the Marxist components of his ideology.

What this question is testing

Strengthen

Your task

Find the choice that makes the argument's conclusion more likely to be true.

Common trap

Answers that are consistent with the argument but add no real support, or that strengthen a claim the argument doesn't make.

Winning move

Locate the gap between evidence and conclusion, then pick the choice that closes it.

Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.

The question
3.

Which one of the following would, if true, most strengthen the claim made by the author in the last sentence of

Answer choices

  1. Correct76% picked this

    Several African novelists who draw upon the oral traditions of West Africa use binary oppositions as fundamental structures in their narratives, even though

    Why this is right

    This supports the view that the use of binary oppositions are derivative of African oral storytelling, since these African novelists have not read Marxist theory.

    Skill tested: Strengthen · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

  2. Weaken6% picked this

    Folklorists who have analyzed oral storytelling traditions from across the world have found that the use of binary oppositions to structure narratives is

    This makes it less likely that the use of binary oppositions are related to African oral storytelling since this structure is common to many oral storytelling traditions across the world.

  3. Weaken5% picked this

    When he trained in Moscow, Sembène read extensively in Marxist political theory and worked to devise ways of synthesizing Marxist theory and the collective

    This makes it more likely that the binary oppositions are related to the Marxist components of Sembène’s ideology.

  4. Too Weak2% picked this

    Very few filmmakers in Europe or North America make use of binary oppositions to

    This narrows down the source of Sembène’s influence, but does not make it more or less likely that the influence was either Marxist or West-African.

  5. Too Weak12% picked this

    Binary oppositions do not play an essential structuring role in the narratives of some films produced by other filmmakers

    Just because some films produced by other filmmakers who subscribe to Marxist ideology do not use binary oppositions as essential structure tools, does not indicate whether Marxist ideology influence Sembène’s use of binary oppositions.

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