Self-study
Professor Chan: The literature department's undergraduate courses should cover only true literary works, and not such frivolous material as advertisements.
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Summarize Argument
Professor Wigmore concludes the literature department is responsible for covering advertisements in its undergraduate courses. Why? Because those courses give students skills to understand texts, and society is negatively affected by people’s inability to understand the real messages of advertisements.
Notable Assumptions
Professor Wigmore assumes the department has the ability and obligation to reduce the harm caused to society by advertising. She assumes covering advertisements in literature courses would allow enough people to understand the real messages of advertisements that it would reduce the amount by which advertisements harm society. In addition, she assumes literature courses will be more effective at helping students understand advertisements if they cover advertisements directly.
20.
Which one of the following ██████████ ████ ████████ ████████ █████████ █████████ █████████
a
Advertisements ought to ██ ██████ ██ ████ █ ███ ████ █████ ████ ████████ ███ ███████████ ██████
This normative judgment doesn’t affect Professor Wigmore’s argument. She does not refer to the way advertisements would ideally be framed.
b
Any text that ██ ██████ ███████████ ███ ███████ ██ █████████ ████████ ███████ ███ ██████ █████ ██ ██ ██████████ █ ████ ██ ███████████
This supports calling advertisements literature—but that’s not Professor Wigmore’s point. She argues advertisements should be covered in literature courses, whether they count as literature or not.
c
All undergraduate students █████ ██ ████ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██ ████████ ███████
This doesn’t support the argument. Undergraduate literature courses help students develop critical skills in understanding texts, whether or not they cover advertisements, according to Professor Wigmore.
d
The literature department's ███████ █████ ██ ██████ ████████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████████ ███ ████ ████ █████ ████ █ ███████ ██████ ██ ████████
This makes concrete a key assumption by Professor Wigmore: that the department has an obligation to reduce the harmful effect on society created by people’s inability to understand advertisements.
e
Any professor teaching ██ █████████████ ██████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██████████ █████ ██ ██ ████ ██ ██████ ███ ████████ ██ ██ ███████ ██ ████ ███████
This doesn’t affect Professor Wigmore’s argument. She concludes that undergraduate literature courses should cover advertisements, not that professors should be forced to cover advertisements even if they don’t want to.