Reading: How the Text Is Built

This is Unit Seventeen of ACT Preparation: how the text is built. Unit sixteen asked what a passage says; this unit asks how it works. One question governs it: what does this choice of word, sentence or structure do? By the end you will be able to find a word's meaning in context. To name a tone and the effect of a phrase. To explain what a paragraph and a structure do. To determine what a narrator can know. And to sort the author's view from the views the passage reports.

Four entries on words in context.

A word as the passage uses it.

ACT 1601 Words in Context

Reading questions ask what a word means as it is used in the passage. In "the senator's plan drew sharp criticism," drew means attracted, not sketched. A word's most familiar meaning is not automatically the one the passage uses.

Clues that define a word.

ACT 1602 Definition and Restatement Clues

A passage may define or restate an unfamiliar word nearby, signaled by or, dashes or commas: "a cofferdam, a temporary wall that keeps water out." In this course, this rule rests on one source, Writing for Success.

Synonyms, opposites and examples.

ACT 1603 Synonym, Antonym and Example Clues

A nearby synonym can signal a word's meaning, a contrast word such as but its opposite, and an example what it means. "Usually garrulous, but that night she barely spoke" makes garrulous mean talkative. This too rests on Writing for Success alone, and a contrast signal reverses the clue.

The substitution test, step by step.

ACT 1604 The Substitution Test

Reread the sentence and its neighbors, find a clue, predict the meaning in your own words, then substitute each choice and keep the one that preserves meaning and tone. A meager rain that "barely darkened the soil" is slight, not generous. The clue types rest on Writing for Success; the substitution method is the course's own. A correct dictionary meaning can still fail the sentence.

Six entries on language, tone and voice.

Simple or complex.

ACT 1605 Simple and Complex Language

An author's language can be simple, reaching every reader, or complex, adding layers for readers who know it: a pamphlet's "swollen glands" against a journal's lymphadenopathy. Jargon serves those who share it and loses those who do not.

Dialect.

ACT 1606 Dialect

Dialect is a way of speaking particular to a region or group, and writers use spelling and word choice to let readers hear it. A character who says "I'm fixing to leave" is placed by her phrasing. Dialect reveals background; it does not signal an error.

Tone.

ACT 1607 Word Choice Sets Tone

Tone is the author's attitude toward the subject, carried by word choice. "The council finally acted" and "the council at last stirred itself" report one event; the second mocks. Name the tone from specific words, not from the topic.

Voice.

ACT 1608 Formal and Informal Voice

Voice is how a writer sounds on the page. A formal voice keeps distance, "residents are advised to remain indoors"; an informal one sounds like conversation, "stay inside, folks." A passage can shift voice on purpose.

The effect of a phrase, step by step.

ACT 1609 The Effect of a Word or Phrase

Reread the phrase in context, compare it with a plain alternative, and name what the author's choice adds. In an invented passage, "the streets did not empty; they exhaled" adds a slow release, relief mixed with loss, where "the streets emptied" would not. Effect questions ask what the words do, not what a dictionary says.

Identifying tone, step by step.

ACT 1610 Identifying Tone

Collect the loaded words, sort them, and choose the tone that fits the whole collection at the right strength. An invented review's "quiet triumph," "generous windows" and "regrets only" make it admiring with a minor complaint; enthusiastic overstates it. Match the strength as well as the direction.

Six entries on structure: rhythm, paragraphs, patterns and purpose.

Sentence length.

ACT 1611 Sentence Length and Rhythm

Short sentences can create emphasis, tension or suspense; long ones can describe or flow. "The ice cracked. She froze. Nobody breathed" builds tension. Ask what the rhythm does in the scene.

Paragraph length.

ACT 1612 Paragraph Length as a Choice

Short paragraphs can build tension; long ones can carry a narrator's continuous thought. A one-sentence paragraph after long ones, "then the phone rang," lands as a turn. A very short paragraph is worth asking why it stands alone.

How a passage is organized.

ACT 1613 How a Passage Is Organized

A passage's structure supports what it communicates: time order, comparison, cause and effect, or a process. An essay on two cities that alternates between them is a comparison. Structure questions ask how the passage is built, not what it says.

A paragraph's role, step by step.

ACT 1614 What a Paragraph Does

State the paragraph's point, compare it with its neighbors, and choose the verb that names its role. In an invented passage on bike lanes, a paragraph opening "not everyone agreed" reports shop owners' fears, and the next shows sales rose anyway, so the first introduces a concern the author then answers. A paragraph's role depends on its neighbors.

The whole structure, step by step.

ACT 1615 How the Whole Passage Is Structured

Label each paragraph's role in a word, read the labels in order, and choose the answer naming the same pattern in the same order. Background, problem, two failed solutions, a success and reflection make a problem traced through attempts to its solution. A choice can name the right parts in the wrong order.

A passage's purpose, step by step.

ACT 1616 The Purpose of a Passage

Decide what the author mainly does, find the target, and choose the answer with the right verb and the right target. An invented passage that traces a water tower's history and then urges readers to oppose its demolition argues for preserving it. When a passage informs and then argues, its purpose is the aim the information serves.

Five entries on point of view and what a narrator can know.

First person.

ACT 1617 First-Person Narrators

A first-person narrator uses I and we, so the reader feels what the narrator feels but knows only what the narrator knows. "I didn't see the letter until morning" limits the story to what the narrator saw. Other characters' thoughts stay closed.

Second person.

ACT 1618 Second Person

Second person uses you and speaks directly to the reader, suiting instructions or a close, dreamlike effect: "you turn the key and step into the cold hallway." When it appears in an essay, ask what the direct address achieves.

Third person.

ACT 1619 Third-Person Narrators

A third-person narrator uses he, she and they and omits I, and can be all-seeing: "neither brother knew the other had already sold the farm." Some forms of third person stay close to a single character.

Narrator and author.

ACT 1620 The Narrator Is Not the Author

The narrator is the voice that tells a story; the author wrote it. A narrator's opinions and mistakes belong to the narrator, as when an author writes a narrator who misjudges everyone. Answer narrator questions from the narrator's words.

What a narrator can know, step by step.

ACT 1621 What the Narrator Knows

Identify the narrator, determine what that narrator can know, and reject claims beyond it. In an invented line, "my sister smiled at the news, and I knew she was secretly furious," the passage supports only that the narrator believed she was furious. A narrator's certainty is not evidence; the smile is the only fact on the page.

Five entries on perspective, and the whole unit in one passage.

Characters' views.

ACT 1622 Characters' Points of View

Different characters can see one event differently: a move to the city is a chance for the daughter and a loss for the grandfather. Answer from the character named in the question.

The author's view and reported views.

ACT 1623 The Author's View and Reported Views

Informational passages often report others' views beside the author's, marked by signal phrases such as critics argue or I think. "Some economists call the tax a burden; I see it as an investment" holds two views, one the author's.

Sources and perspective.

ACT 1624 Sources and Their Perspectives

A passage may draw on experts, witnesses, studies and records, each with its own perspective; a mayor and a resident see one road project differently. Ask who is speaking, and what each source would have reason to say.

Whose view, step by step.

ACT 1625 Whose View Is This?

Read the claim's signal phrase, sort the author's views from others', and assign each view to the right person at the right strength. In an invented passage, planners promised a stadium would revive downtown, owners doubt it, and the author argues the evidence favors the owners: the benefit so far is limited to game days. Promised, doubt and I would argue each mark a different speaker.

The whole unit in one passage.

ACT 1626 A Passage Read for Craft

Craft questions ask what a choice of word, sentence or structure does. In an invented passage, a grandmother keeps forty years of accounts in a green ledger and uses a gift computer as a stand for her fern. People called her stubborn; the narrator called her precise. Precise means exact, set against stubborn by contrast. The point of view is first person, so her claim that the ledger never lost a cent is reported, not proved. The short sentences, "the ledger never crashed; it never needed a password," create a quick defense. And stubborn is other people's view, precise the narrator's. Test meanings by substitution, judge choices by what they do, and keep every view attached to its speaker.

Look at what you can now do. You can find a word's meaning from nearby clues and test it by substitution. You can name a tone at the right strength and say what a phrase adds. You can explain what a paragraph does among its neighbors, and name a passage's structure and purpose. You can tell what a narrator can and cannot know. And you can keep the author's view apart from the views the passage reports. Unit eighteen turns to arguments, evidence, and passages read side by side.