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<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at906.png
For this one, I put C. I didn't put D because I thought it had to be parallel? BUt I guess C isn't parallel either.. So why D over C?</p></li>
<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at906.png
For this one, I got it right because of pure luck. I don't get why it's A, not B, C, D, or E?</p></li>
<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at907.png
Uh, whaa? Don't know at all! Please help!</p></li>
<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at907.png
Got it right. But don't know why it can't be A, B, or E</p></li>
<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at907.png
I thought it had to be parallel...?</p></li>
<li><p>Imageshack</a> - screenshot20120531at908.png
Got it right, but why can't it be C?</p></li>
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<li>This question is foremost about syntax as it relates to coordination and phrasal connection rather than to parallelism.</li>
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<p>Choice (A) is wrong because the relative pronoun “which” creates faulty predication here. “Which [in substitution of “pamphlets”] she also edited” is a complete dependent clause. “Edited” is a transitive verb here, which usually means that it is followed by an object (e.g., “I edit the paper”). </p>
<p>However, in relative clauses whose predicate verbs are transitive, the relative pronoun serves as this object even though it precedes the verb (e.g., “I admire everyone who reads the paper, which I edit”). To nonetheless follow “edited” with another object (here “the National Anti-Slavery Standard”) is wrong.</p>
<p>Choice (B) yields ungrammatical coordination in the form of a comma splice. On the SAT, comma splices – the adjacency of two independent clauses with the separation of only a comma but no coordinating conjunction – are incorrect. “She also edited the…” is an independent clause, as is “Lydia Child authored widely…”</p>
<p>Relevant differentiation among choices (C), (D), and (E) is slightly challenging. </p>
<p>If we were to omit “plus” from choice (C), it would be correct in its use of a participial phrase (“having edited…”). However, the resultant causal or explanatory relationship implied between this phrase and the independent clause (“Lydia Child authored…”) is questionable: Editing one publication does not justify or even clarify her having personally authored multiple pamphlets. </p>
<p>Inserting “also” helps this logical tension a bit, as it implies additional accomplishment rather than any descriptive relationship. This would still be fine grammatically. “Plus,” however, is a slightly hazy word denotatively but can arguably be employed adverbially in lieu of “also.” This could work, but it’s undesirable.</p>
<p>Choice (E) can be safely discarded because “besides,” though serving as a decidedly grammatical adverbial alternative to the ambiguous “plus,” precedes the independent clause “she was editor of…” We have another comma splice here.</p>
<p>Choice (D) is the best option. “In addition to” makes it clear, unlike in choice (C), that the editing is on top of the authorship, rather than explanatory of it in some way as participial phrases usually indicate. There is also no problem of parallelism as you feared: “In addition to” must always be followed by a gerund (here “editing”).</p>
<p>This is a weak question because (C) is not refutable on grammatical grounds as straightforwardly or even as objectively as wrong choices on the Writing section almost pervasively are. Most people’s subjective grammatical sense would guide them away from choice (C), though.</p>
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<li>This question tests syntax and predication. </li>
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<p>“Whether an artist works through photography, painting, or dance” cannot alone make a complete sentence because the subordinating conjunction “whether” renders it a dependent clause. The text succeeding this clause must therefore be an independent clause. </p>
<p>Choice (A): “Making a connection with an audience is paramount” is indeed an independent clause. The verb is “is” is the subject; the gerundial phrase “making a connection” is the subject. Gerunds, being noun verbals, can serve as subjects. This choice is grammatical.</p>
<p>Choice (B): “The artist, while connecting with an audience is paramount” is not an independent clause, which we need it to be. In fact, it represents faulty syntax even internally. “While connecting with an audience is paramount” is another dependent clause introduced by the subordinating conjunction “while.” “The artist” is therefore flanked by two dependent clauses, and it serves no subjective or objective role in the sentence. This errant phrase and the incomplete syntax are each reasons for this choice to be wrong.</p>
<p>Choice (C): “By connecting with an audience is paramount” exhibits faulty predication. “By connecting with an audience” cannot serve as a subject because “by” is prepositional and not nominalizing; that is, “by” does not render the phrase a noun or functional noun, as it must be to serve as the subject. We don’t have a proper independent clause here.</p>
<p>Choice (D): “The art, which connect with an audience is paramount” has subject-verb disagreement, faulty predication, and ungrammatical syntax. “Art” is singular, so “connect,” which is (by the nexus of the relative pronoun “which”) a verb with which it must agree in number, must be “connects.” Also, the art itself is not paramount; it is the actualization of art’s human-connective capacity that is. Finally, the syntax suffers because a comma does not follow “audience,” which is necessary to offset the dependent clause.</p>
<p>Choice (E): “And to make a connection with an audience is paramount” yields ungrammatical syntax because of bad coordination. The coordinating conjunction “and” ought not connect the introductory dependent clause to an independent clause; the conjunction “whether” already serves this connecting purpose. Aside from that error, though, the choice is fine: “To make a connection with an audience” is an acceptable infinitive phrase substitute for the gerundial phrase because both are functional noun phrases.</p>
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<li>This question tests redundancy. An opposite opinion or viewpoint disagrees with the opinion that it opposes; this is definitionally assured. Explication of this relationship is redundant.</li>
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<p>Choices (A), (B), and (E) can be discarded by this realization alone. Choice (C) is unclear in its use of “there”; where exactly? </p>
<p>Choice (D), however, uses “there” as an expletive pronoun rather than as a locational pronoun and serves merely to introduce the clause that there “is always an opposite opinion,” which is a simple thought that nonetheless says as much as every other choice. No one disagrees with this viewpoint, do they?</p>
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<li>Choice (A) is wrong because “it” needs to be “its” in order to possessively modify the gerund “being.” If “being” were a participle here, “it” would be acceptable. This is a complicated topic that I have discussed before. See the section on “Failing to distinguish between participles and gerunds” in my guide: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/955109-silverturtles-guide-sat-admissions-success.html#post10765552[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/955109-silverturtles-guide-sat-admissions-success.html#post10765552</a>. If you need clarification further, I will provide it.</li>
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<p>Choice (B) is ostensibly an ungrammatical attempt at a dependent clause. “Which,” the relative pronoun that would subordinate the succeeding clausal material, introduces with should therefore be a clause. However, we have no verb: “being a work of fiction” is merely a participial phrase, or maybe it’s even meant to be a gerundial phrase. We can’t tell; in either case, there is no verb to make a clause.</p>
<p>Choice (C) is wrong because “irregardless” is not a word; “regardless” is the correct alternative. Otherwise, it’s fine. This choice represents a test of diction.</p>
<p>Choice (D) properly uses “though” to offset a qualifying phrase. "Though” is not a subordinating conjunction here, so that “a work of fiction” is not clausal is acceptable.</p>
<p>Choice (E) tests the same concept that I briefly described for why choice (A) is wrong (the need for “its” rather than “it”). It also misuses “notwithstanding,” whose standard use is to be placed after the qualifying material, as in “its being a work of fiction notwithstanding.”</p>
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<li>This is a rather messy sentence, so it’s not entirely clear what core concept this question wants most to test.</li>
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<p>Choice (A) is good at least up until right after its dependent clause (“whose ruins have never been recovered”), which is properly offset by commas and followed by a verb, “thrived.” Two problems come later, though. “Until the fourth century A.D. on the coast of Egypt when it burned to the ground” makes “when” less than desirable in its distance from its referent, “the fourth century A.D.” </p>
<p>Also, a comma must proceed “when it burned to the ground” because this dependent clause is non-restrictive and merely descriptive. There is only one fourth century A.D., so modifying that phrase with a clause will not restrict the multiple temporal potentialities down to one particular period; the phrase itself tells us exactly which one century we mean. It is therefore non-restrictive; its semantic value is descriptive, not essential. Commas are used to offset non-restrictive phrases and clauses.</p>
<p>As an example of restrictive clausal relationships, read this: “The storm came on the day after when the authorities predicted it.” “When the authorities predicted it” is restrictive on the phrase “the day after” because there are many days that could be meant, so the lack of a comma is appropriate.</p>
<p>Choice (B) solves the comma problem but preserves the significant distance between “when” and its referent and also incorrectly implies a backwards causal relationship between the non-recovery of the ruins and the burning of the library. “Having never been recovered” implies that the non-recovery is the cause of what is to be described, the burning. Instead, the more logical alternative is that the burning precluded recovery of the library’s remains.</p>
<p>Choice (C) has bad syntax. “Whose ruins…up until the fourth century A.D.” is a dependent clause. Omitting it for syntactic clarity, we have “The vast Library of Alexandria thriving when it burned to the ground,” which has no verb outside its dependent clause (“when it burned to the ground”) and so is not an independent clause. Sentences need at least one independent clause.</p>
<p>Choice (D) has similarly bad syntax. Again omitting the dependent clause, we have “The vast Library of Alexandria it thrived from 295 B.C. until the fourth century A.D.” “It” ought not sit adjacent to its referent.</p>
<p>Choice (E) has sound syntax, places “when” immediately after its referent, and separates them with the comma to indicate non-restriction. It looks good.</p>
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<li>“Herrera wants so much to see improvements in the lives of the workers” is not a complete independent clause because “so” triggers the need for “that” so that the correlative conjunction “so…that” is finished. No choice other than “B” does so. Even “thus” of choice (C) does not preserve this necessary syntactic relationship, which we can also infer from the fact that “thus devoting…” is a participial phrase when in fact we need the termination of an independent clause.</li>
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