PE 4 - Reading Comprehension | Reading Comprehension
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Answer the following questions based on the passage given below.
While most archeologists believe that primitive European societies were patriarchal in both their social and religious structures, a new controversial theory challenges these traditional views. This theory suggests that during the Stone Age there thrived in and around Europe peace-loving, matriarchal communities in which men and women lived together as equals, respected nature, and worshipped a nurturing deity called the Great Goddess.
The people of "Old Europe " - Europe from 7000 B.C. to 3500 B.C. - lived in stable agricultural societies in which women headed clans and men labored as hunters and builders, but neither sex acted as a dominant force with respect to the other. War was shunned and craftspeople created comfortable dwellings and graceful ceramics instead of weapons. Like the woman—centered social system, the religion of Stone Age Europe focused on women in its veneration of the life-generating Great Goddess and other female deities. Worship was closely linked to the themes of respect for life and regeneration.
Proponents of this theory contend that this peaceful and harmonious society was shattered by waves of Indo-European invaders in about the year 3500 B.C., when marauders from the Russian steppes transformed Europe from a peaceful, agrarian culture to one in which men dominated women and wars raged. Social and sexual egalitarianism were replaced by patriarchy and hierarchy, and warrior gods dethroned the Great Goddess. With the widespread decimation of Old Europe, the goddess-centered religion went underground. However, its symbols have reappeared over the centuries in the forms of the female deities of Greece and Rome, in the Virgin Mary, and in the belief in spiritual forces lurking within the natural world.
The theory of the Great Goddess has been hailed by feminist social critics, artists, and religious thinkers for providing an important alternative to traditional, patriarchal mythologies and paradigms, as well as for providing a new and more positive model for the human relationship to the natural world.
Eminent anthropologist Ashley Montagu calls the theory "a benchmark in the history of civilization", yet many other investigators into prehistoric Europe consider the theory an unsubstantiated and idealistic version of history. To a number of critics, the chief problem in this radical theory is one of method. Traditional archeologists, taking issue with unorthodox speculation on ancient belief systems, contend that archeological evidence may tell us something about what people ate in the small villages of prehistoric Europe, how they built their homes, and what they traded, but cannot tell us much about what the dwellers of the ancient world actually thought. To them, such speculation is illegitimate. The most severe critics warn that, in blurring the distinction between intuition and fact, proponents of the new theory have failed as scientists.
But supporters of the theory of a goddess-worshipping Old Europe counter that such critiques reveal a certain narrow-mindedness on the part of scientists rather than weaknesses on the part of their theory arguing that some degree of speculation is important, perhaps even necessary, for the sake of progress in archeology and other fields. This element of speculation helps reveal the implications of a theory.
Which of the following would be contrary to what a proponent of the theory of the Great Goddess most likely believes?
- (a)
The available archaeological evidence does not rule out the idea that Old European matriarchal communities existed.
- (b)
The field of archaeology has been dominated in the past by male—oriented scholarship.
- (c)
Matriarchy is conducive to establishing a healthy relationship with the natural world.
- (d)
The decimation of Old European society wiped away all traces of the Great Goddess religion.
Solution
Discuss
ReportSupporters of the Great Goddess theory might justifiably counter the traditionalist argument that archeological evidence "cannot tell us much about what the dwellers of the ancient world actually thought " (second last paragraph) by pointing out that the traditionalist argument implies that:
- (a)
archeology cannot hope to be anything more than a fruitless enterprise.
- (b)
there is no good reason to think that primitive European society was socially patriarchal.
- (c)
understanding the thinking of more modern cultures should likewise be considered impossible.
- (d)
ancient people functioned at a considerably lower intellectual level than do modern humans.
Based on the information in the passage, which of the following statements about prehistoric European society would traditional archeologists most likely consider illegitimate?
- (a)
The people were agrarian and not nomadic.
- (b)
Food was cooked in clay vessels over a fire.
- (c)
Arrows and spears were the most commonly used instruments of warfare.
- (d)
The people were worried about invasion.
If it were conclusively demonstrated through archeological evidence that the society of Old Europe had in fact been patriarchal and warlike, one would expect those who had supported the Great Goddess theory to contend that:
- (a)
it was a mistake to have extended the bounds of scientific scholarship to the realm of imagination.
- (b)
speculating incorrectly had nevertheless been a valuable exercise.
- (c)
no one could have anticipated that the more unorthodox theory would be the correct one.
- (d)
traditional archeologists must have doctored the evidence to fit their conclusions.
Which of the following maxims seems most in agreement with the argument that the supporters of the Great Goddess theory put forth in response to criticism?
- (a)
Those who live by the sword will die by the sword.
- (b)
A mind is like a parachute in that it only works when open.
- (c)
He who does not understand his opponent's arguments does not understand his own.
- (d)
The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
A proponent of the matriarchal theory might argue that the theory serves all but which of the following purposes?
- (a)
Showing the existence of bias in the scientific establishment
- (b)
Providing a model of sexual equality for present—day society to emulate
- (c)
Broadening the unnecessarily conservative limits of conventional archeology
- (d)
Demonstrating that matriarchies are consistently more egalitarian than are patriarchies