501 Critical Reading Questions

c. Because their song is one of mourning, c is the most logical
choice. In addition, the context clue Samuel was still alive, but tells
us that the song is traditionally reserved for the dead.
245.
c. To sing a mourning song for someone who is still alive suggests
that that person’s life is mournful—full of grief, sadness, or sorrow.
246.
b. In line 9, the narrator states that Thomas wanted his tears to be indi-
vidual, not tribal, suggesting too that he felt his father deserved to
be mourned as an individual.
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Critical Reading Questions
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247.
e. The author is speaking figuratively here—the BIA does not liter-
ally collect and ferment Indian tears and return them to the reser-
vation in beer and Pepsi cans.
248.
c. In line 23, the narrator states that Thomas wanted the songs, the sto-
ries, to save everybody. The paragraph tells readers how many songs
Thomas knew but how something seemed to be missing (e.g., he
never sang them correctly); how Thomas wanted to play the guitar
but how his guitar only sounded like a guitar (lines 22–23). He
wanted his songs to do more, to rescue others.
249.
d. In lines 15–17, Doc Burton emphasizes change. He tells Mac that
nothing stops and that as soon as an idea (such as the cause) is put
into effect, it [the idea] would start changing right away. Then he
specifically states that once a commune is established, the same
gradual flux will continue. Thus, the cause itself is in flux and is
always changing.
250.
b. The several references to communes suggest that the cause is
communism, and this is made clear in line 31, when Mac says Rev-
olution and communism will cure social injustice.
251.
a. In lines 21–25, Doc Burton describes his desire to see the whole pic-
ture, to look at the whole thing. He tells Mac he doesn’t want to
judge the cause as good or bad so that he doesn’t limit his vision.
Thus, he is best described as an objective observer.
252.
d. In the first part of his analogy, Doc Burton says that infections are
a reaction to a wound—the wound is the first battleground (line 40).
Without a wound, there is no place for the infection to fester. The
strikes, then, are like the infection in that they are a reaction to a
wound (social injustice).
253.
a. By comparing an individual in a group to a cell within the body
(line 50), Doc Burton emphasizes the idea that the individual is
really not an individual at all but rather part of a whole.
254.
c. In lines 59–62, Doc Burton argues that the group doesn’t care
about the standard or cause it has created because the group simply
wants to move, to fight. Individuals such as Mac, however, believe in
a cause (or at least think they do).
255.
a. Doc Burton seems to feel quite strongly that group-man simply
wants to move, to fight, without needing a real cause—in fact, he
states that the group uses the cause simply to reassure the brains of
individual men (lines 61–62).
256.
b. Doc Burton knows how deeply Mac believes in the cause and
knows that if he outright says the group doesn’t really believe in the
cause that Mac would not listen. Thus he says “It might be like this,”
emphasizing the possibility. Still Mac reacts hotly.
501