AP English Language and Composition 5.6 Passage Drill

[ mumbles ]

Which of the following is the grammatical equivalent of "hitherto"? [Question related to passage]

And here are the potential answers.

All right, well, even if we've never heard the word "hitherto,"

we can still use context to get the right answer. [a lady writing something]

The easiest thing to do is swap each option for "hitherto"

and see if the sentence still works.

We'll begin with E.

It doesn't work to stick the word "specifically" in "hitherto"'s place.

Well, there's just no need for "specifically" here.

Why would the speaker need to clarify that he's specifically

speaking about philosophy in the first sentence? [Man talking to a lady about philosophy]

He starts out talking about philosophy, so we don't need to be

told that's what he's specifically talking about it. He's just talking about it.

All right, we're beating a dead horse here. That's a gross expression. [eyes of a horse popping]

All right, choice C makes the same mistake as E,

just more obviously. This is the first sentence, so nothing's been mentioned before.

All right, while we're at it, we'll nix B for the same reason. {Evaluating options]

We also only use the word "nevertheless" when we're referring

to an earlier point. We'd say,

"She didn't like Brad because he had bad breath. [a girl disgusted by the boy's breath]

Nevertheless, she went out with him because she felt bad for him."

But it makes no sense to start off

with just "Nevertheless, she went out with him."

And then there's choice D. We usually use the phrase

"to all appearances" when something appears [narrator evaluating options]

to be something it's not. We might say,

"To all appearances, Brad was just a stinky dork,

but then she found out he was a sick DJ." [DJ playing some music]

Well, the phrase doesn't work in the first sentence of this passage, though.

It'd make sense if the speaker's larger point were that

contrary to popular belief

philosophy has been ethically neutral.

That's the opposite of what he's saying, though, so option D is eliminated.

The correct answer is A. In philosophy, [narrator continues reading]

thus far, ethical neutrality has been seldom sought

and hardly ever achieved.

"Thus far" means "up until now"

and the speaker is talking about the fact that philosophy has

been in sore need of some ethical neutrality for quite a while. [a Doctor talking to his patient]

When we were kids and we stole cookies from the cookie jar,

our parents told us we were in the wrong, and we told them

they oughta try a little ethical neutrality. [boy stealing a cookie from a cookie jar]

[ squeaking ]