What rhetorical purpose does an author achieve by opening an essay with a striking paradox?
Answer and explanation
Correct answer: A. Provoking reader curiosity and challenging conventional assumptions
- Step 1: Examine the stylistic function of a paradox (a seemingly self-contradictory statement revealing a deeper truth).
- Step 2: Opening with a paradox arrests reader attention, disrupts complacency, and invites readers to explore the resolution through the essay.
Answer
Provoking reader curiosity and challenging conventional assumptions.
Why not the others: Paradoxes do not aim to prove language illogical, alienate readers, or discredit science.
Practise more Reading Comprehension and Text Analysis.
Free questions with an explanation for every one, and full timed EmSAT Achieve (UAE) mock tests.
More Reading Comprehension and Text Analysis questions
- What rhetorical strategy does an author employ when citing peer-reviewed empirical studies and statistical margins of error to support a the…
- In an argumentative essay, what is the primary structural function of a concession followed by a rebuttal?
- Read the sentence: 'The corporation's ephemeral commitment to conservation evaporated as soon as commodity prices dipped.' What does 'epheme…
- Which logical fallacy occurs when an author oversimplifies a complex policy debate into an absolute dilemma with only two extreme outcomes?
- What tone is conveyed by the sentence: 'The preliminary findings warrant guarded optimism, though replication across diverse patient cohorts…
- What literary device is utilized in the phrase: 'The desert dunes were an ocean of shifting amber waves beneath the midday sun'?