GRE Argument Topic 19

GRE Argument Topic 19

Topic:

The following appeared in an article written by Dr. Karp, an anthropologist.

"Twenty years ago, Dr. Field, a noted anthropologist, visited the island of Tertia and concluded from his observations that children in Tertia were reared by an entire village rather than by their own biological parents. However, my recent interviews with children living in the group of islands that includes Tertia show that these children spend much more time talking about their biological parents than about other adults in the village. This research of mine proves that Dr. Field's conclusion about Tertian village culture is invalid and thus that the observation-centered approach to studying cultures is invalid as well. The interview-centered method that my team of graduate students is currently using in Tertia will establish a much more accurate understanding of child-rearing traditions there and in other island cultures."

Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.

موارد زیر در مقاله ای نوشته شده توسط دکتر کارپ، یک انسان شناس آمده است. بیست سال پیش، دکتر فیلد، یک انسان شناس برجسته، از جزیره ترتیا بازدید کرد و از مشاهدات خود نتیجه گرفت که کودکان در ترتیا به جای والدین بیولوژیکی خود توسط کل دهکده تربیت می شوند. با این حال، مصاحبه های اخیر من با کودکانی که در این گروه جزایر که شامل ترتیا می شود، زندگی می کنند نشان می دهد که این کودکان زمان بسیار بیشتری را صرف صحبت در مورد والدین بیولوژیکی خود می کنند تا در مورد دیگر بزرگسالان روستا. این تحقیق من ثابت می کند که نتیجه گیری دکتر فیلد در مورد فرهنگ دهکده ترتیان فاقد اعتبار است و بنابراین رویکرد مشاهده محور برای مطالعه فرهنگ ها نیز نامعتبر است. روش مصاحبه محور که تیم دانشجویان تحصیلات تکمیلی من در حال حاضر در ترتیا استفاده می کنند، درک بسیار دقیق تری از سنتهای تربیت کودک در آنجا و سایر فرهنگهای جزیره ای ایجاد می کند.
پاسخی بنویسید و در آن توضیح دهید که چه مستندات خاصی برای ارزیابی بحث لازم است و شرح دهید که چگونه این مستندات می تواند بحث را تضعیف یا تقویت کند.

NOTE: The above topic has wording similar to Argument Tasks 10 and 21 of this Website. However, if you read carefully you will notice that the topic and the task instructions are different. Hence, it is very important to read the topic as well as its instructions completely before you start to write your response.

Strategies
Argument:
The interview-centered method will establish a more accurate understanding of child- rearing traditions in Tertiary than did the observation- centered approach.
In developing your response, you are asked to identify specific evidence that Dr. Karp needs to sustain the validity of his position.

Facts and Assumptions:
a) Twenty years ago, Dr. Field observed that children in Tertia were reared by an entire village rather than by their own biological parents.
b) Recently, Dr. Karp visited the group of islands that includes Tertia and used the interview-centered method to study child-rearing practices. Readers of this passage might assume that he interviewed residents of Tertia to compare practices from twenty years ago to those of today.
c) The children interviewed by Dr. Karp spent more time talking about their biological parents than other adults in the village. The assumption is that child- rearing practices may have changed over the last twenty years or that Dr. Field's conclusions were incorrect.
d) Dr. Karp did conclude that Dr. Field’s conclusions must be invalid. The assumption is that Dr. Karp's methods yield more accurate results.

Questions:
a) Why did Dr. Field choose the observation-center method to study the people of Tertia? Did he have good results with that method in previous studies?
b) What prompted Dr. Karp to visit this group of islands? Did he actually visit and interview the residents of Tertia?
c) What types of questions did Dr. Karp use with the children he interviewed? Did he ask them about all adults, or did he restrict his questions to those about their parents?
d) Have child-rearing practices changed in the twenty years between the two visits?
Your notes do not have to be exhaustive. As you begin to write your essay, your brain will generate new ideas. Make certain that you keep the directions in mind as you develop your ideas.

NOTE: The above topic has wording similar to Argument Tasks 10 and 21 of this Website. However, if you read carefully you will notice that the topic and the task instructions are different. Hence, it is very important to read the topic as well as its instructions completely before you start to write your response.

Sample 1:

Ever since Margaret Mead journeyed to study the Samoans in the early part of the twentieth century, anthropologists have continued to investigate the social mores of remote groups around the world. Each anthropologist is bound to have a preferred method for confuting research, and they may alternate those methods depending on what aspect of the culture they are investigating. To evaluate Dr. Karp's recommendation, the reader requires evidence that his interview-centered method is superior to Dr. Field's observation-centered approach.

The first piece of evidence should reveal the purpose of each anthropologist's visit to the area of Tertia. It is not even clear that Dr. Karp actually visited Tertia itself. The passage implies that each of them purposely studied child-rearing practices since no mention is made of other results. However, it could be that those results are ancillary to the real purpose of each visit. The studies may have had a broader scope than is revealed in this passage. In addition, if Dr. Karp pursued this study in reaction to the data, he saw from Dr. Field’s work, he may have made assumptions about the study’s conclusions that would bias his experimental design.
Dr. Karp currently has a team of graduate students using the interview-based method to study child- rearing practices in Tertia. The content of an interview can be designed to elicit specific types of responses. Do the questions lead the children of Tertia to talk about their parents rather than other adults on the island? There is a world of difference between asking, "When do your parents feed you?" and "When do you eat your meals?" Are the graduate students using questions developed by Dr. Karp, or have they created their own questions? Grad students may not have enough experience to write questions that are objective.

Twenty years have passed since Dr. Field visited and observed the residents of Tertia. Is there evidence of any outside influences on village life since his visit? The rapid growth of technology has created the global village, and it is difficult to imagine that Tertia has not been, at least tangentially, affected. Satellites have made access to the World Wide Web possible from virtually anywhere on the globe. Cellular phones are ubiquitous. It is even possible that Dr. Field's visit, itself, influenced the behavior of the Tertians. In fact, it would be unrealistic to believe that child-rearing practices have remained static anywhere.

The one piece of evidence that is clear is that Dr. Karp wrote the article. It is doubtful that this anthropologist has maintained an objective point of view while contrasting the two research methods. An opinion delivered by a scientist with no vested interest in the outcome might be the strongest evidence for evaluating the strength of the argument.


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