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Mexican agrarian revolution

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Mexican agrarian revolution

by ranjeet75 » Wed Feb 01, 2012 9:14 am
At the time of the Mexican agrarian revolution, the most radical faction, that of Zapata and his followers, proposed a return to communal ownership of [u]land, to what had been a pre-Columbian form of ownership respected by the Spaniards[/u].
A. land, to what had been a pre-Columbian form of ownership respected by the Spaniards
B. land, a form of ownership of the pre-Columbians and respected by the Spaniards
C. land, respected by the Spaniards and a pre-Columbian form of ownership
D. land in which a pre-Columbian form of ownership was respected by the Spaniards
E. land that had been a pre-Columbian form of ownership respected by the Spaniards

OA is [spoiler]A[/spoiler]
[spoiler]why B is wrong and in A how "...., to what had been ......." is right?[/spoiler]
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by MakeUrTimeCount » Thu Feb 02, 2012 1:10 pm
In B:
1) pre-Columbians is incorrect usage.
2) Also respected should be replaced by past-perfect.

In A:
proposed a return to A, to what had been B

Although "to what" is awkward. But had been correctly refer to something in past.

A looks best :)
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by e-GMAT » Thu Feb 02, 2012 2:15 pm
ranjeet75 wrote:[spoiler]why B is wrong and in A how "...., to what had been ......." is right?[/spoiler]
At the time of the Mexican agrarian revolution, the most radical faction, that of Zapata and his followers, proposed a return to communal ownership of land, to what had been a pre-Columbian form of ownership respected by the Spaniards.

Use of "to what had been..." is correct in the original choice. "what had been a pre-Columbian form of ownership respected by the Spaniards" describes "communal ownership of land". Use of past perfect is correct here because this communal ownership of land existed in the time of pre-Columbian period, which is of course older than the period when the faction of Zapata and his followers "proposed" to get back to this form of ownership. We need verb sequencing here to distinctly show the different time periods in the past when the proposal was made and when the communal ownership was actually practiced. Indeed, we do not come across such constructions quite often and hence get confused.

Choice B is incorrect because:
1. use of "a form of ownership of the Pre-Columbian" seems to suggest that somebody owned pre-Columbians. The phrase does not communicate the sense of the form of ownership belonging to the pre-Columbians, as does "the pre-Columbian form of ownership". It rather conveys the sense of a form of owning pre-Columbians.

2. Also if you notice, use of "and" introduce a list in the sentence with entities that modify "communal ownership of land". Both the entities in the list are showing the characteristics of this "communal ownership of land" but grammatically they are not parallel. "a form of..." is a noun phrase while "respected..." is a verb-ed modifier.

Hope this helps.
Shraddha

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