Part 2: Summarizing an Author’s Viewpoint in an Informational Text – Flashcards

Which line would be best to include in a summary of "Hokusai's The Great Wave"?

Read the excerpt from "Hokusai's The Great Wave" by Neil MacGregor. The Japanologist Donald Keene, from Columbia University, sees the wave as a metaphor for the changes in Japanese society: The Japanese have a word for insular which is literally the mental state of the people living on islands: shimaguni konjo. Shimaguni is 'island nations' konjo is 'character'. The idea is they are surrounded by water and, unlike the British Isles, which were in sight of the continent, are far away. The uniqueness of Japan is often brought up as a great virtue. A new change of interest in the world, breaking down the classical barriers, begins to emerge. I think the interest in waves suggests the allure of going elsewhere, the possibility of finding new treasures outside Japan, and some Japanese at this time secretly wrote accounts of why Japan should have colonies in different parts of the world in order to augment their own riches. The Great Wave, like the other images in the series, was printed in at least 5,000 impressions, possibly as many as 8,000, and we know that in 1842 the price of a single sheet was officially fixed at 16 mon, the equivalent of a double helping of noodles. This was cheap, popular art; but when printed in such quantities, to exquisite technical standards, it could be highly profitable. Which line is a direct quotation from an external source?

What must students use when summarizing an informational text? Check all that apply.

Read the excerpt from "Hokusai's The Great Wave." But there are other ways of reading Hokusai's Great Wave. Look a little closer and you see that the beautiful wave is about to engulf three boats with frightened fishermen, and Mount Fuji is so small that you, the spectator, share the feeling that the sailors in the boats must have as they look to shore - it's unreachable, and you are lost. This is, I think, an image of instability and uncertainty. The Great Wave tells us about Japan's state of mind as it stood on the threshold of the modern world, which the US was soon going to force it to join. Which is the best summary of this excerpt?

Read the excerpt from "Hokusai's The Great Wave." Hokusai has taken more than colour from the West - he has also borrowed the conventions of European perspective to push Mount Fuji far into the distance. It is clear that Hokusai must have studied European prints, which the Dutch had imported into Japan and which circulated among artists and collectors. So The Great Wave, far from being the quintessence of Japan, is a hybrid work, a fusion of European materials and conventions with a Japanese sensibility. No wonder this image has been so loved in Europe: it is an exotic relative, not a complete stranger. What is the author's viewpoint in this excerpt?

Read the excerpt from "Hokusai's The Great Wave" by Neil MacGregor. Here's a snatch of the letter from the president of the United States that Perry delivered to the Japanese emperor: Many of the large ships-of-war destined to visit Japan have not yet arrived in these seas, and the undersigned, as an evidence of his friendly intentions, has brought but four of the smaller ones, designing, should it become necessary, to return to Edo in the ensuing spring with a much larger force. But it is expected that the government of your imperial majesty will render such return unnecessary, by acceding at once to the very reasonable and pacific overtures contained in the president's letter . . . This was textbook gunboat diplomacy, and it worked. Japanese resistance melted, and very quickly the Japanese embraced the new economic model, becoming energetic players in the international markets they had been forced to join. They began to think differently about the sea that surrounded them, and their awareness of the possible opportunities in the world beyond grew fast. What type of outside source does MacGregor use in this excerpt?

Read the excerpt from "Early Victorian Tea Set" by Neil MacGregor. As it got cheaper, tea also spread rapidly to the working classes. By 1800, as foreigners remarked, it was the new national drink. By 1900 the average tea consumption per person in Britain was a staggering 6 lbs (3 kilograms) a year. In 1809 the Swede Erik Gustav Geijer commented: Next to water, tea is the Englishman's proper element. All classes consume it . . . in the morning one may see in many places small tables set up under the open sky, around which coal-carters and workmen empty their cups of delicious beverage. How does Geijer's comment support MacGregor's point?

Which statement expresses a viewpoint?

Read the excerpt from "Early Victorian Tea Set." But a loving, tranquil cup of tea has a violent hinterland. When all tea came into Europe from China, the British East India Company traded opium for silver and used that silver to buy tea. The trade was so important that it brought the two countries to war. The first of the conflicts, which we still refer to as the Opium Wars - they were in fact just as much about tea - broke out more or less as our teapot was leaving the Wedgwood factory. Partly because of these difficulties with China, in the 1830s the British set up plantations in the area around Calcutta and Indian tea was exempted from import duty to encourage demand. What is the author's viewpoint in this excerpt?

Which line would be best to include in a summary of "Early Victorian Tea Set"?

Read the excerpt from"Early Victorian Tea Set." What could be more domestic, more unremarkable, more British, than a nice cup of tea? You could of course put the question the other way round and ask what could be less British than a cup of tea, given that tea is made from plants grown in India or China and often sweetened by sugar from the Caribbean. It is one of the ironies of British national identity - or perhaps it says everything about our national identity - that the drink which has become the worldwide caricature of Britishness has nothing indigenous about it,

Read the excerpt from "Early Victorian Tea Set" by Neil MacGregor. This is quite clearly mid-range pottery, simple earthenware of a sort that many quite modest British households were then able to afford. But the owners of this particular set must have had serious social aspirations, because all three pieces have been decorated with a drape of lacy hallmarked silver. The historian Celina Fox explains that tea-time had become a very smart event: In the 1840s the Duchess of Bedford introduces the ritual of afternoon tea, because by this time dinner had become so late, seven-thirty to eight o'clock, that it was a bit of a gap for the British tummy between lunchtime and evening. For a while there was a revival of tea-drinking, as a sort of meal for sandwiches and so forth, around four o'clock. Which line is a direct quotation from an external source?

Read the excerpt from "Hokusai's The Great Wave." So The Great Wave, far from being the quintessence of Japan, is a hybrid work, a fusion of European materials and conventions with a Japanese sensibility. No wonder this image has been so loved in Europe: it is an exotic relative, not a complete stranger. It also, I think, shows a peculiarly Japanese ambivalence. As a viewer, you have no place to stand, no footing. You too must be in a boat, under the Great Wave, and in danger. The dangerous sea over which European things and ideas travelled has, however, been drawn with a profound ambiguity.

A source is a(n) an author can use to research and develop ideas in an informational text.