Self-study
P1
Traditionally, members of a community such as a town or neighborhood share a common location and a sense of necessary interdependence that includes, for example, mutual respect and emotional support. ███ ██ ██████ █████████ ████ ████ █████████████ ███ █████████ ████ ███████████ ██████ ████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ████████████ ████ █████ ███████████ ███████ ██ █████ ██ ███████ ███
Problem ·
Trending away from communities of people in the same geographic area
Modern people spend less time interacting in ways that are required for thriving communities. (We don't interact with our neighbors as much.)
Potential solution? / Computer advocates' perspective ·
Computer conferences constitute communities
These communities can substitute for traditional interactions with physical neighbors.
P2
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Computer advocates' support 1 ·
People in computer conferences often share common interests
Think about Reddit forums.
Computer advocates' support 2 ·
Certain conventions constitute etiquette, which helps form genuine relationships through the computer
Example of convention: abbreviations, typing characters designed to look like a face to convey emotion.
P3
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Critique / Author's main point ·
Computer conferences are not communities
Concedes that conferences can be respectful and supportive, like actual communities. But they're still not communities.
Author's support 1 ·
Conferences don't allow certain people in
People without basic knowledge of computers or enough resources to access conferences can't join.
Author's support 2 ·
Conference participants are self-selecting; actual communities are not
Actual communities are more likely to have real diversity of age, career, and personal interests.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Problem-analysis
6.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ █████ ████ ██████ ███ ██ ███ ████████ █████████ ██ ███ ████ ██████████
a
Participants in computer ███████████ ███ █████████ ████ █████████ ██ █████████ ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ██████
This doesn’t undermine the author’s position, because what the author cares about is actual diversity among the participants; whether the participants accept diversity is a separate issue from whether they are actually diverse.
b
Computer technology is ███████ ████████ ████ ██████████ ███ ██████████ ██ ██████ ████ █ ███████ ██ ████████████
This weakens the author’s position by undermining the argument that “conferences discriminate along educational and economic lines because participation requires a basic knowledge of computers and the ability to afford access to conferences.” (B) provides a reason to think that people who participate in computer conferences are more diverse along economic and educational lines than the author believes.
c
Participants in computer ███████████ █████ █████ ███ ████ ██████ ██ ███████ ███ ███████ ████ ███████ ████ ███ ███████ ██ ████████████ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ████████████
This doesn’t weaken the author’s position, because the author already acknowledges that computer conferences may involve respectful and supportive interactions. This type of interaction isn’t relevant to why the author believes computer conferences aren’t communities.
d
Participants in computer ███████████ █████ ████ ████ ███████████ ███████████ ██ ███ ████████ ███████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ████████ ███████ █████████ █████ ███████████
It’s not clear how the comfort participants in computer conferences feel with anonymous communication relates to the author’s argument.
e
The conventions used ██ ██████████ █████████████ ██ ████████ ███████████ ███ █████████ ████ ██████████ ████ █████ ████ ██ ██████ ████████████
It’s not clear how the success of communication conventions relates to the author’s argument.