LSAT 145 | Section 1 | Reading Comprehension: Q15

RC Question 15 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: The author of passage A would be most likely to…

DISCUSSION: The author of passage A noted that history was moving towards gender analysis and away from discussing the history of individual women.

Passage B discusses no individual women. It only discusses broad trends and social constraints. So it’s an example of the gender analysis the author of passage A discussed.

___________

1. Passage B doesn’t actually say what the ancients thought about gender. Gender itself (in the modern sense) wasn’t even a concept until the 1980s. So the ancients had no opinions on it.
2. The author only discussed masculinity and femininity (lines 11-16) to give examples of topics. They didn’t express personal beliefs about the value of either concept.
3. CORRECT. Passage B tells us nothing about individual women. And lines 5-7 and 30-32 show the author thought individual women’s stories were important. So this is likely something the author would notice.
4. The author of passage A doesn’t say what role domesticity has played in contemporary politics. So it’s impossible for us to say how the author would view a comparison between the modern era and ancient Rome.
5. Highly doubtful. The analysis in passage B spent one sentence discussing marital laws (lines 40-44), and there’s nothing to indicate that historians were unaware of these laws. It’s the analysis of the laws’ impact that is novel.