Inferences — Worked example

- [Instructor] Let's take a look at this question from the reading and writing test. "Jokes are notoriously difficult to translate into other languages, but it can be done: a recent English translation of Ahmad Faris al-Shidyaq's 1855 Arabic language novel, 'Leg over Leg' includes many jokes that have lost none of their humor in their new language. The challenge for translators comes from the joke's heavy reliance on cultural context for their humorous effect. To successfully render a joke in another language, translators often must immerse themselves in details specific to the origin culture and then alter the details of the joke so that it works in the destination language and culture. The translator who focuses solely on finding the direct equivalent of each word in a joke will therefore risk," blank. Okay, if you would like to try this one on your own before I work through it, please pause the video now. Okay, so the presence of the phrase, "Logically completes the text," leads me to identify this as an inference question. You might find that these questions take you a little bit longer than other questions do, but that's okay. The time you save on other more straightforward questions will give you some breathing room to really dig into these and understand the argument. Or maybe you happen to find these questions dead easy, in which case, lucky you. (laughs) Inference questions require you to break an argument down into its component pieces, premises, the facts of the argument, and conclusions, what those facts are being organized to say. Sometimes you'll be given a conclusion and you'll need to find a fact that supports it, and in this question, we've got the opposite. We have some background facts that need to be tied together into a conclusion. Let's talk strategy, because approaching these questions will require thinking like a detective. To break apart the argument, it can be helpful to turn the text into a series of bullet points. I like to rephrase and simplify them in my own words. Doing this can help you identify the argument and find the gap in it. You'll start to get a sense of what does or doesn't fit in there, which will be useful when you begin to test the choices against the argument. Only one choice will fill in that gap, either as a premise that bolsters the conclusion you've been given or as a conclusion that ties together the premises you've been given. The choice that strengthens the argument is your answer. Let's go back to this question. So I already read this question aloud a minute or so ago, so let's dive into bulletizing the passage. Jokes are notoriously difficult to translate, but this one translation from Arabic to English gets it right. I'm going to write, joke translation. Hard, but possible. What does it take to translate a joke? Jokes need cultural context in order to land, but that context needs translation too when it enters the target language. And actually I think in the next line, the semicolon between culture and a translator is important. It's marking a new independent clause, sure, but it's telling us that this sentence with the blank in it is closely connected to the previous one. Sentence one, this is what makes a joke work. Sentence two, if you don't do this, blank. Translation without context equals what? "A translator who focuses solely on a direct translation but ignores context will therefore risk," blank. What are we therefore risking? So look at what we got. We're looking for a choice that is supported by the first three facts and fills in the blank in this conclusion. Translating jokes is hard. Jokes need cultural context to work. That context needs to get translated too. If it isn't, what do you get? So, let's go through the choices. Choice A: over-emphasizing the context, I don't even need to keep reading. This, isn't it. We're looking for something that doesn't translate the context. Cross it off. Okay. Choice B. A translator who focuses solely on finding the direct equivalent of each word in a joke will therefore risk producing a translation that is literally correct, but unfunny. Yeah, I mean, that strikes me as correct. If you don't translate the context, then you're not getting the point of the joke and therefore it won't be funny. This follows the premises and it strengthens the argument. I'm like 99% sure this is the answer, but let's check out the last two choices. I'm gonna put a little check mark here. Choice C: risking creating a new joke that is itself culturally specific. This feels like it's moving the goalpost a little. It doesn't link directly to any ideas in the text, so I'm not sure this follows logically or supports the premises. It certainly doesn't seem to make the argument stronger. We can eliminate it. And choice D: it risks explaining the joke at such length that it is no longer amusing. This is a lot like choice A. Explaining the joke means translating the context, and we're talking about instances where that doesn't happen. We can knock this one out too. So choice B is our answer. Two of the things I did in this worked example can be boiled down into top tips. You gotta keep it specific. Choice C moved the goalposts and started talking about new jokes that were still culturally specific and that broadens the scope of the argument to something not discussed in the text. If a choice strays from the points made in the passage, you can eliminate it. And it really helps to look for transition words. I keyed in on the word therefore in the last sentence of the passage because that signaled an important transition for the argument. Being aware of that pivot helped me realize it was setting up the conclusion and that semicolon helped too. These questions can seem intimidating, but they just need to be broken down. You have the tools and the skills to take them on. So go forth in confidence! Good luck out there, test takers. You've got this.