Reading comp PrepTest 121 · Section 3 · Question 15

Topic: Legal Studies

Paragraph 1

• Paragraph note
  • Background/Intro to implied legal question
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Native Canadians don’t have their rights defined in law
  • Native Peoples - Right to govern selves and land; ownership over movable cultural property
  • Traditional statute/law - Movable property owned by museums/custodians
  • Recent litigation/Native Canadians - Owned by Native Peoples
  • Suggested Question - Who owns it? Who should?

Paragraph 2

• Paragraph note
  • Current legal framework; Alternative argument
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Current (Canadian law) - Private property - Items are owned and can be transferred
  • Alternative (Native Canadians) - Collective ownership - People use items that are collectively owned, but they can’t transfer them out

Paragraph 3

• Paragraph note
  • Current situation; Author’s prediction/opinion
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Current - Courts recognize ownership of museums who have documents
  • Prediction - Courts will recognize collective property; courts will and “should” honor claims of Native Canadians

Main Point: Courts should and will increasingly view claims of Native Canadians to movable cultural property as invoking the idea of collective ownership, thus honoring their communal ownership rights in these items.

Lines 9-14 - Key legal issue/question raised

Lines 15-16 - Current approach

Lines 25-28 - Alternative approach

Lines 53-61 - Author’s prediction and opinion on what “should” happen

Question/Answer and Old Approach/New Approach - This passage enmeshes two common Meta-Structures in a way that happens relatively frequently in Legal Studies passages. It presents a Question that the legal system needs to address, which suggests a Question/Answer Meta-Structure. Here, that question is: Who owns Native Canadian movable cultural property (Lines 9-14)? In such a Meta-Structure, the Author’s answer (or her opinion of a key answer) is the main point. Frequently, though, in a Legal Studies passage, the answer to the legal question involves a New Approach to that area of law, which is what we see here! The Author presents the current approach - basing the decision on the idea of private property (Lines 15-16). She then highlights an alternative - basing the decision on the idea of collective ownership (Lines 25-28), which is how Native Canadians have traditionally viewed ownership of their movable cultural property. At the end of the passage, the Author predicts that this approach will become more common (Lines 55-60) and endorses it (“should be honored,” Line 61). In an Old Approach/New Approach passage, the Author’s opinion of the New Approach serves as the main point. Here, the Author endorses the New Approach as an Answer to the key legal Question in the passage, so that is our main point, as we summarized above.

Prediction - Predictions are almost always featured in questions when one is made by the Author. Here, the Author doesn’t just endorse the use of the concept of communal property/collective ownership in cases involving Native Canadian property claims, but she also predicts that courts “will gradually recognize” that it’s the appropriate framework in these cases. Such a prediction on the core topic of the passage should be reflected in the main point and will likely feature in a question or two.

Nothing here!