The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
For early postcolonial literature, the world of the novel was often the nation. Postcolonial novels were usually [concerned with] national questions. Sometimes the whole story of the novel was taken as an allegory of the nation, whether India or Tanzania. This was important for supporting anti-colonial nationalism, but could also be limiting – land-focused and inward-looking.
My new book "Writing Ocean Worlds" explores another kind of world of the novel: not the village or nation, but the Indian Ocean world. The book describes a set of novels in which the Indian Ocean is at the centre of the story. It focuses on the novelists Amitav Ghosh, Abdulrazak Gurnah, Lindsey Collen and Joseph Conrad [who have] centred the Indian Ocean world in the majority of their novels. . . . Their work reveals a world that is outward-looking – full of movement, border-crossing and south-south interconnection. They are all very different – from colonially inclined (Conrad) to radically anti-capitalist (Collen), but together draw on and shape a wider sense of Indian Ocean space through themes, images, metaphors and language. This has the effect of remapping the world in the reader's mind, as centred in the interconnected global south. . . .
The Indian Ocean world is a term used to describe the very long-lasting connections among the coasts of East Africa, the Arab coasts, and South and East Asia. These connections were made possible by the geography of the Indian Ocean. For much of history, travel by sea was much easier than by land, which meant that port cities very far apart were often more easily connected to each other than to much closer inland cities. Historical and archaeological evidence suggests that what we now call globalisation first appeared in the Indian Ocean. This is the interconnected oceanic world referenced and produced by the novels in my book. . . .
For their part Ghosh, Gurnah, Collen and even Conrad reference a different set of histories and geographies than the ones most commonly found in fiction in English. Those [commonly found ones] are mostly centred in Europe or the US, assume a background of Christianity and whiteness, and mention places like Paris and New York. The novels in [my] book highlight instead a largely Islamic space, feature characters of colour and centralise the ports of Malindi, Mombasa, Aden, Java and Bombay. . . . It is a densely imagined, richly sensory image of a southern cosmopolitan culture which provides for an enlarged sense of place in the world.
This remapping is particularly powerful for the representation of Africa. In the fiction, sailors and travellers are not all European. . . . African, as well as Indian and Arab characters, are traders, nakhodas (dhow ship captains), runaways, villains, missionaries and activists. This does not mean that Indian Ocean Africa is romanticised. Migration is often a matter of force; travel is portrayed as abandonment rather than adventure, freedoms are kept from women and slavery is rife. What it does mean is that the African part of the Indian Ocean world plays an active role in its long, rich history and therefore in that of the wider world.
Question for CAT 2023 Reading Comprehension Questions - 2
Try yourself:All of the following claims contribute to the "remapping" discussed by the passage, EXCEPT:
Explanation
- The 'Indian Ocean world', as described in the passage relates to the interconnected oceanic world of the global south (East Africa, the Arab coasts, and South and East Asia) with long-lasting connections made possible by sea travel in the Indian Ocean.
- The passage states that the global south was the first center of globalisation ('Historical and archaeological evidence suggests that what we now call globalisation first appeared in the Indian Ocean') and that the world of early international trade and commerce was not the sole domain of white Europeans ('Those [commonly found ones] are mostly centered in Europe or the US, assume a background of Christianity and whiteness, and mention places like Paris and New York.
- The novels in [my] book highlight instead a largely Islamic space..'). So, options A, B and D are true.
- Option C is the opposite of what the passage states.
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Question for CAT 2023 Reading Comprehension Questions - 2
Try yourself:Which one of the following statements is not true about migration in the Indian Ocean world?
Explanation
- The passage does not state or imply that the Indian Ocean world's migration networks connected the global north with the global south. Option C is not true.
- Option A is true :'For much of history, travel by sea was much easier than by land, which meant that port cities very far apart were often more easily connected to each other than to much closer inland cities'
- Option B, too, is true. The passage states that the Indian Ocean world references a different set of histories and geographies than the ones most commonly found in fiction in English, which 'assume a background of Christianity and whiteness, and mention places like Paris and New York'. The interconnected portcities of the global south feature a largely Islamic space and a cosmopolitan culture.
- Option C is also true. On migration in the Indian Ocean world, the passage states 'Migration is often a matter of force; travel is portrayed as abandonment rather than adventure, freedoms are kept from women and slavery is rife.'
- So, option C is the correct answer choice.
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Question for CAT 2023 Reading Comprehension Questions - 2
Try yourself:On the basis of the nature of the relationship between the items in each pair below, choose the odd pair out:
Explanation
All given relationships are valid except option A. According to the passage, postcolonial novels were usually concerned with national questions and did not involve border crossing.
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Question for CAT 2023 Reading Comprehension Questions - 2
Try yourself:All of the following statements, if true, would weaken the passage's claim about the relationship between mainstream English-language fiction and Indian Ocean novels EXCEPT:
Explanation
- The passage claims mainstream English-language fiction and Indian Ocean novels are unlike each other and set in different worlds.
- Option A, if true, strengthens the passage's claim. All other statements, if true, weaken the passage's claim.
- If the depiction of Africa in most Indian Ocean novels is driven by an Orientalist imagination of its cultural crudeness, then the Indian Ocen novels would be no different from mainstream English-language fiction. So, option B, if true, weakens the passage's claim.
- The passage states that most mainstream English-language novels have historically been set in American and European metropolitan centres. Option C, if true, weakens the passage's claim.
- According to the passage, in the Indian Ocean novels, the depiction of Africa is not romanticised. Option D, too, if true, would weaken the passage's claim.
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