Matthew Arnold, through his Culture and Anarchy (1869), Placed the Word “Culture” at the Center of Debates

Reading Passage Question

Matthew Arnold, through his Culture and Anarchy (1869), placed the word “culture” at the center of debates about the goals of intellectual life and humanistic society. Arnold’s definition of culture as “the pursuit of perfection by getting to know the best which has been thought and said” helped define the Western world’s liberal arts curriculum over the next century. Although three forms of dissent from his views have had considerable impact of their own, each one misunderstands Arnold.

The first protested Arnold’s designation of “anarchy” as culture’s enemy, viewing this dichotomy simply as a struggle between a privileged power structure and radical challenges to it. Yet, Arnold himself was plagued in his soul by the blind arrogance of the world’s reactionary powers. Another form of opposition saw Arnold’s culture as a perverse perpetuation of literary learning in a world where science had become the new arch from which any new order of thinking must develop. At the center of the “two cultures” debate were the goals of the formal educational curriculum, the principal vehicle through which Arnoldian culture operates. But Arnold himself had viewed culture as enacting its life in a much more broadly conceived set of institutions. Today, Arnoldian culture is sustained, if indirectly, by a third form of dissent, multiculturalism, which seeks to deflate the imperious authority that “high culture” exercises over curriculum while promoting the idea that we must learn what is representative because we have overemphasized what is exceptional. Yet, multiculturalism actually affirms Arnold by returning us to a tension inherent in the idea of culture. The social critics, defenders of science, and multiculturalists wrongly insist that Arnold’s culture is simply a device for ordering us about. Instead, it is designed to register the gathering of ideological clouds on the horizon. Perfection mattered to Arnold only as the background against which we could form a just image of our actual circumstances, just as we can conceive finer sunsets and unheard melodies.

“Matthew Arnold, through his Culture and Anarchy (1869), placed the word “culture” at the center of debates ”- is a GMAT reading comprehension passage with answers. Candidates need a strong knowledge of English GMAT reading comprehension.

This GMAT Reading Comprehension consists of 7 comprehension questions. The GMAT Reading Comprehension questions are designed for testing candidates’ abilities in understanding, analyzing, and applying information or concepts. Candidates can actively prepare with the help of GMAT Reading Comprehension Practice Questions.

Solution and explanation

1. The author of the passage is primarily concerned with

(A) arguing against those who have opposed Arnold’s ideas.
(B) describing Arnold’s conception of culture.
(C) explaining why Arnold considered the pursuit of perfection to be the essence of culture.
(D) tracing Arnold’s influence on the liberal arts educational curriculum.
(E) examining the different views of culture that have emerged since the mid-eighteenth century.

2. It can be inferred from the passage that the two-cultures debate

(A) emerged as a reaction to the multiculturalist movement.
(B) developed after 1869.
(C) influenced Arnold’s thinking about culture.
(D) was carried on by American as well as European scientists.
(E) led to two competing educational systems.

3. In criticizing Arnold’s dissenters, the author employs all of the following methods EXCEPT:

(A) Pointing out the paradoxical nature of an argument against Arnoldian culture
(B) Presenting evidence that conflicts with a claim made by Arnold’s dissenters
(C) Asserting that a claim made by the dissenters is an oversimplification
(D) Drawing an analogy between one of the dissenters’ claims and another insupportable theory
(E) Suggesting that the focus of one of the dissenters’ arguments is too narrow

4. It can be inferred from the information in the passage that Arnoldian culture is perpetuated today by

(A) the two-cultures debate.
(B) postmodernists.
(C) imperious elitists.
(D) existentialists.
(E) social critics.

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