Over The Last Several Decades Some Significant Shifts In Family GMAT Reading Comprehension

Reading Passage Question

Over the last several decades some significant shifts in family have transformed the traditional forms of family and shaped what is now generally called the “new family.” The most essential feature of the new family is its deviation from the nuclear family concept centred on the heterosexual married couple of male breadwinner, female homemaker both as a demographic and as a cultural norm. The dominance of the nuclear family was underpinned by an interlocking matrix of assumptions that constituted an ideology of this family form as “natural” when it was, in actuality, a specific cultural and historical form that emerged in the West in the 19th century. Anthropologists and feminist historians have argued that nuclear family was a construct that was nationalistic and racially exclusionary as well as well as exclusionary of other sexualities. New families are refreshingly diverse in their configurations in terms of sexuality, race, ethnicity etc. The new family is also a changing or “flexible” family. Rather than a set of permanent relations, the new family often adjusts its configuration over time through cohabitation, marriage, divorce and remarriage.

An exemplary ideological representation of the new family is the film Under the Tuscan Sun. The film has as its core a recently divorced heterosexual American woman who purchases a villa while on vacation with a gay tour. The main character starts out alone and in a more traditional and familiar context, but by the end of the film, she is surrounded by her new family that includes a Polish immigrant worker, his new Italian wife, the main character's Asian-American lesbian friend and her new-born baby, and the new American lover of the main character. The film exemplifies “affective theories” about the new family. Affective theory sees the new family as a series of singular families that are the product of the desires of individuals. Family forms, on these terms, “elect” to engage in various practices and relations. They make choices which, while constrained to varying degrees, are ultimately individual choices that go beyond the boundaries of class and structure.

“Over the last several decades some significant shifts in family”- is a passage for the GMAT that address reading comprehension. Candidates must have a firm understanding of GMAT reading comprehension in English. This GMAT reading comprehension section consists of 4 comprehension questions. The purpose of the GMAT Reading Comprehension questions is to assess a candidate's capacity to understand, evaluate, and apply knowledge or ideas. By responding to the GMAT Reading Comprehension Practice Questions section, candidates can actively practice.

Solutions and Explanation

1. What is the primary purpose of the passage?

1. Compare and contrast nuclear and new families
2. Describe and explain a societal change
3. Illustrate the norm of new families by citing cultural examples
4. Trace the origin and form of a recent societal phenomenon
5. Highlight the salient features of a revolutionary societal transformation

2. The author suggests that the film Under the Tuscan Sun exemplifies affective theories about the new family most probably because the film

1. traces the emergence of a multicultural and polysexual family whose members are biologically unrelated
2. departs from conventional film themes of heterosexual married couples
3. portrays how a departure from traditional and familiar contexts can pose social challenges
4. depicts a series of singular families bound together by class and structure
5. challenges the idea of a nuclear family that is racially and sexually exclusionary

3. It can be inferred from the passage that the author of the passage is most likely to describe the emergence of new families as

1. A much anticipated societal change
2. An aberration from the accepted norm
3. A shift from a flexible and open social structure
4. A deviance from the natural state of affairs
5. A celebration of individual choice

4. When referring to nuclear families, the author of the passage mentions the word “natural” within quotes most probably to

1. Censure the preservation of nuclear families as the ideal unit of society
2. Indicate surprise at the displacement of nuclear families by new families
3. Concur with the definition of nuclear families as the ideal societal unit
4. Express scepticism about the perception that nuclear families are the universal norm
5. Disparage the nuclear family as a cultural and historical form specific only to the West

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