At the end of the nineteenth century, a rising interest
in Native American customs and an increasing desire to
understand Native American culture prompted ethnolo-
gists to begin recording the life stories of Native Amer-
（5) ican. Ethnologists had a distinct reason for wanting to
hear the stories: they were after linguistic or anthropo-
logical data that would supplement their own field
observations, and they believed that the personal
stories, even of a single individual, could increase their
（10) understanding of the cultures that they had been
observing from without. In addition many ethnologists
at the turn of the century believed that Native Amer-
ican manners and customs were rapidly disappearing,
and that it was important to preserve for posterity as
（15) much information as could be adequately recorded
before the cultures disappeared forever.
There were, however, arguments against this method
as a way of acquiring accurate and complete informa-
tion. Franz Boas, for example, described autobiogra-
（20) phies as being “of limited value, and useful chiefly for
the study of the perversion of truth by memory,” while
Paul Radin contended that investigators rarely spent
enough time with the tribes they were observing, and
inevitably derived results too tinged by the investi-
（25) gator’s own emotional tone to be reliable.
Even more importantly, as these life stories moved
from the traditional oral mode to recorded written
form, much was inevitably lost. Editors often decided
what elements were significant to the field research on a
（30) given tribe. Native Americans recognized that the
essence of their lives could not be communicated in
English and that events that they thought significant
were often deemed unimportant by their interviewers.
Indeed, the very act of telling their stories could force
（35) Native American narrators to distort their cultures, as
taboos had to be broken to speak the names of dead
relatives crucial to their family stories.
Despite all of this, autobiography remains a useful
tool for ethnological research: such personal reminis-
（40) cences and impressions, incomplete as they may be, are
likely to throw more light on the working of the mind
and emotions than any amount of speculation from an
ethnologist or ethnological theorist from another
culture.
Which of the following best describes the organization of the passage？
A．The historical backgrounds of two currently used research methods are chronicled.
B．The validity of the data collected by using two different research methods is compared.
C．The usefulness of a research method is questioned and then a new method is proposed.
D．The use of a research method is described and the limitations of the results obtained are discussed.
E．A research method is evaluated and the changes necessary for its adaptation to other subject areas are discussed.
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ASSET:
A．credential
B．liability
C．refutation
D．responsibility
E．unsteadiness -
Maps made by non-Native Americans to depict Native American land tenure, resources andpopulation distributions appeared almost as early as Europeans’ first encounters with NativeAmericans and took many form. missionaries’ field sketches, explorers’ drawings, and surveyors’maps, as well as maps rendered in connection with treaties involving land transfers. Most existingmaps of Native American lands are reconstructions that are based largely on archaeology, oralreports, and evidence gathered from observers’ accounts in letter, diaries, and official reports;accordingly, the accuracy of these maps is especially dependent on the mapmakers’ owninterpretive abilities.
Many existing maps also reflect the 150-year role of the Bureau of Indian Affairs （BIA) inadministering tribal lands. Though these maps incorporate some information gleaned directly fromNative Americans, rarely has Native American cartography contributed to this official record,which has been compiled, surveyed, and authenticated by non-Native American tribes and theirmigrations and cultural features, as well as territoriality and contemporary trust lands, reflects theorigins of the data, the mixed purposes for which the maps have been prepared, and changes both IUnited States government policy and in non-Native Americans’ attitudes toward an understandingof Native Americans.
Which of the following best describes the content of the passage？
A．A chronology of the development of different methods for mapping Native Americans
B．A discussion of how the mapmaking techniques of Native Americans differed from those of Europeans
C．An argument concerning the presenta-day uses to which historical maps of Native American lands are put
D．An argument concerning the nature of information contained in maps of Native American lands
E．A proposal for improving the accuracy of maps of Native American lands -
The author of the passage would be most likely to describe the explanation provided by the human capital theory for the high concentration of women in certain occupations in the seventeenth-century Florence textile industry as__
A．well founded though incomplete
B．difficult to arciculate
C．plausible but poorly substantiated
D．seriously flawed
E．contrary to recent research -
It can be inferred from the passage that a characteristic of the ethnological research on Native Americans conducted during the nineteenth century was the use of which of the following？
A．Investigators familiar with the culture under study
B．A language other than the informant’s for recording life stories
C．Life stories as the ethnologist’s primary source of information
D．Complete transcriptions of informants’ descriptions of tribal beliefs
E．Stringent guidelines for the preservation of cultural data -
The last paragraph performs which of the following functions in the passage？
A．It summarizes the discussion thus far and suggests additional areas of research.
B．It presents a recommendation based on the evidence presented earlier.
C．It discusses an exceptional case in which the results expected by the author of the passage were not obtained.
D．It introduces an additional area of concern not mentioned earlier.
E．It cites a specific case that illustrates a problem presented more generally in the previous paragraph.