Friday, January 4, 2013

GMAT sentence correction: Think beyond grammar


Fine, you know the GMAT SC jargon – tense error, pronoun error, subject verb disagreement. Good. Useful. But you must think beyond grammar to do justice to the range SC questions.

One of such errors is ambiguity. That is something is not clear. To make clear the meaning conveyed. So keep track of meaning  also while checking a sentence for errors.
Illustration  - real GMAT questions

1. Incorrect: In mammals, a lifetime’s supply of egg cells is produced during fetal development and remain dormant until maturity.

Here remain dormant is ambiguously used; one may ask what remain egg cells or development? In such cases, we need to repeat the word, cells, since these remain dormant until maturity.  The verb is agrees with the singular sub lifetime’s supply.

Correct … is produced during fetal development and the cells remain dormant until maturity.

2. In 1869, anxious to balance its population of 8,000 men and 2,000 women, the Wyoming legislature extended voting rights to women in Wyoming.

A. its population of 8,000 men and 2,000 women, the Wyoming legislature
B. their population of 8,000 men and 2,000 women, the Wyoming’s legislature
C. the state’s population of 8,000 men and 2,000 women, the Wyoming legislature
D. a state population of 8,000 men and 2,000 women, the legislature in Wyoming
E. its population of 8,000 men with 2,000 women, the Wyoming’s legislature

So since you know that singular pronouns agree with singular nouns, its agrees with Wyoming legislature. But grammar alone wont rescue us here.

Look at the meaning, can Wyoming legislature have population?  No the population belongs to the state, C is clear and exact. D, would mean any state’s population, not necessarily Wyoming’s.

Moral of the story
Attention to detail…is very important..keep looking out for similar errors; match grammar with meaning.


4 comments:

  1. Hello, I am preparing for GMAT exams and sentence correction being the weakest section I am trying to locate similar sites and blogs for GMAT sentence correction tips and questions that may help me. Kindly provide me the answer to the 2nd questions. Also, can you let review this particular book for me - GMAT Sentence Correction 3rd Edition Book that I saw at http://www.wiziq.com/course/16189-gmat-sentence-correction-book-3rd-edition. I am planning to buy it. thanks in advance.

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  2. Thanks rizzi for the info, i found a combo course for GMAT verbal... i really loved the GMAT sentence correction part in this pack... very nice examples and ofocurse the explanation as well...
    really i would say you dont need any other study material for GMAT prep if you have this...
    http://www.wiziq.com/course/15896-gmat-verbal-grail-combo-study-material

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