Reading comp PrepTest 122 · Section 3 · Question 16

Topic: Social Science

*Note - We are mirroring the use of woman/women as an adjective for consistency with the passage

Paragraph 1

• Paragraph note
  • Correction of a viewpoint
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Old viewpoint - The earliest woman doctor was in 1321 (first record of licensure), or in 1849 (first earned MD)
  • New view - Surviving sources suggest there were women doctors in ancient Greece and Rome, and it was a normal occurrence

Paragraph 2

• Paragraph note
  • Generalization/Example
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Generalization - The lack of lists and commentary suggest that women doctors were uncommon but unremarkable
  • Example - Plato’s The Republic - Refers to women doctors in making other argument

Paragraph 3

• Paragraph note
  • Generalization/Examples
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Generalization - Not just midwives
  • Example 1 - Different words for doctor and midwife
  • Example 2 - Epitaphs

Paragraph 4

• Paragraph note
  • Generalization/Examples
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Generalization - Writings of women doctors referenced without note
  • Examples - Galen, Pliny the elder, others

Main Point: There are a variety of texts from Ancient Greece and Rome that suggest women doctors were a normal part of society.

Lines 5-10 - Author’s viewpoint

Lines 10-16 - Author rejects an implied opposing viewpoint

Lines 20-23 - One generalization supporting the Author’s viewpoint

Lines 36-38 - Another generalization supporting the Author’s viewpoint

Lines 47-50 - A third generalization supporting the Author’s viewpoint

Old Theory/New Theory - While an Old Theory isn’t explicitly tied to a specific group, one is implied at the end of Paragraph 1 where the Author brings up something that is “by no means” true - that the first woman doctor was Francesca de Romana in 1321, or Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell in 1849. She instead argues that there’s textual evidence that women doctors were a common and unremarkable fact in ancient Greece and Rome (Lines 5-10). This suggests an Old Theory/New Theory passage, a determination that is backed up by the Author analyzing different textual evidence to support different theses relevant to this broader new theory throughout the rest of the passage. When dealing with an Old Theory/New Theory passage, the New Theory is the main point if the Author agrees with it, and her opinion of the New Theory is the main point if she doesn’t endorse it. Here, she endorses it, so the main point is that new theory, as we summarized it above.

Generalization/Examples - In order to support her New Theory, the Author breaks the textual evidence she references in Line 1 down into a few generalizations that all support that new theory in some way. Each of Paragraphs 2-4 have an introduction of general support, followed by example(s) of text that support it, or a trend in surviving texts that do so. Since each of these support the new theory, they’re not central to the main point and thus don’t need to be referenced in it. However, they are central to the argument, serving as the sole support for it; they also make up ¾ of the passage. As such, we should have an idea of what general point each paragraph is set up to make, and what the examples are that are included in each, as we noted in our summary. If you didn’t do something similar, you might have had difficulty getting through the questions efficiently!

When a passage so crucially relies on examples, it’s really important to have them noted in a way that makes them easy to find, so be sure to incorporate that as a part of your process!