NinetynineCAT 2025 Slot 3 VARC RC Passage 1 Q3–Q6
A reading comprehension passage from the Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension (VARC) section of CAT 2025 Slot 3, with 4 questions (RC · Arts & Culture). Answers are CAT's official key.
The passage
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Once a society accepts a secular mode of creativity, within which the creator replaces God, imaginative transactions assume a self-conscious form. The tribal imagination, on the other hand, is still to a large extent dreamlike and hallucinatory. It admits fusion between various planes of existence and levels of time in a natural and artless manner. In tribal stories, oceans fly in the sky as birds, mountains swim in water as fish, animals speak as humans and stars grow like plants. Spatial order and temporal sequence do not restrict the narrative. This is not to say that tribal creations have no conventions or rules, but simply that they admit the principle of association between emotion and the narrative motif. Thus stars, seas, mountains, trees, men and animals can be angry, sad or happy.
It might be said that tribal artists work more on the basis of their racial and sensory memory than on the basis of a cultivated imagination. In order to understand this distinction, we must understand the difference between imagination and memory. In the animate world, consciousness meets two immediate material realities: space and time. We put meaning into space by perceiving it in terms of images. The image-making faculty is a genetic gift to the human mind—this power of imagination helps us understand the space that envelops us. With regard to time, we make connections with the help of memory; one remembers being the same person today as one was yesterday.
The tribal mind has a more acute sense of time than the sense of space. Somewhere along the history of human civilization, tribal communities seem to have realized that domination over territorial space was not their lot. Thus, they seem to have turned almost obsessively to gaining domination over time. This urge is substantiated in their ritual of conversing with their dead ancestors: year after year, tribals in many parts of India worship terracotta or carved-wood objects representing their ancestors, aspiring to enter a trance in which they can converse with the dead. Over the centuries, an amazingly sharp memory has helped tribals classify material and natural objects into a highly complex system of knowledge. . . .
One of the main characteristics of the tribal arts is their distinct manner of constructing space and imagery, which might be described as 'hallucinatory'. In both oral and visual forms of representation, tribal artists seem to interpret verbal or pictorial space as demarcated by an extremely flexible 'frame'. The boundaries between art and non-art become almost invisible. A tribal epic can begin its narration from a trivial everyday event; tribal paintings merge with living space as if the two were one and the same. And within the narrative itself, or within the painted imagery, there is no deliberate attempt to follow a sequence. The episodes retold and the images created take on the apparently chaotic shapes of dreams. In a way, the syntax of language and the grammar of painting are the same, as if literature were painted words and painting were a song of images.
Once a society accepts a secular mode of creativity, within which the creator replaces God, imaginative transactions assume a self-conscious form. The tribal imagination, on the other hand, is still to a large extent dreamlike and hallucinatory. It admits fusion between various planes of existence and levels of time in a natural and artless manner. In tribal stories, oceans fly in the sky as birds, mountains swim in water as fish, animals speak as humans and stars grow like plants. Spatial order and temporal sequence do not restrict the narrative. This is not to say that tribal creations have no conventions or rules, but simply that they admit the principle of association between emotion and the narrative motif. Thus stars, seas, mountains, trees, men and animals can be angry, sad or happy.
It might be said that tribal artists work more on the basis of their racial and sensory memory than on the basis of a cultivated imagination. In order to understand this distinction, we must understand the difference between imagination and memory. In the animate world, consciousness meets two immediate material realities: space and time. We put meaning into space by perceiving it in terms of images. The image-making faculty is a genetic gift to the human mind—this power of imagination helps us understand the space that envelops us. With regard to time, we make connections with the help of memory; one remembers being the same person today as one was yesterday.
The tribal mind has a more acute sense of time than the sense of space. Somewhere along the history of human civilization, tribal communities seem to have realized that domination over territorial space was not their lot. Thus, they seem to have turned almost obsessively to gaining domination over time. This urge is substantiated in their ritual of conversing with their dead ancestors: year after year, tribals in many parts of India worship terracotta or carved-wood objects representing their ancestors, aspiring to enter a trance in which they can converse with the dead. Over the centuries, an amazingly sharp memory has helped tribals classify material and natural objects into a highly complex system of knowledge. . . .
One of the main characteristics of the tribal arts is their distinct manner of constructing space and imagery, which might be described as 'hallucinatory'. In both oral and visual forms of representation, tribal artists seem to interpret verbal or pictorial space as demarcated by an extremely flexible 'frame'. The boundaries between art and non-art become almost invisible. A tribal epic can begin its narration from a trivial everyday event; tribal paintings merge with living space as if the two were one and the same. And within the narrative itself, or within the painted imagery, there is no deliberate attempt to follow a sequence. The episodes retold and the images created take on the apparently chaotic shapes of dreams. In a way, the syntax of language and the grammar of painting are the same, as if literature were painted words and painting were a song of images.
Question 3
All of the following, if true, would weaken the passage's claims about the hallucinatory tribal imagination EXCEPT that:
- Ashamanic rituals involving conversing with the dead often feature in tribal stories.
- Btribal art excludes the depiction of the mundane reality of everyday life and objects.
- Ctribal narratives exhibit a chronological beginning, middle, and end.
- Dtribal stories depict the natural world in accordance with rational scientific knowledge.
Answer: (A) shamanic rituals involving conversing with the dead often feature in tribal stories. RC · Arts & Culture MCQ
Solution
- The passage calls tribal imagination 'hallucinatory': planes of existence fuse, no fixed sequence, art merges with everyday life, and tribals converse with dead ancestors.
- B (no mundane everyday content), C (chronological narratives) and D (rational, scientific depiction) each contradict one of these claims, so each weakens it.
- A, stories featuring conversations with the dead, fits the passage's own account of trance rituals, so it does not weaken it.
Shortcut. In an EXCEPT-weaken question, look for the option that agrees with the passage.
Question 4
On the basis of the passage, which one of the following explains the main difference between imagination and memory?
- ATribal groups value memory over imagination when it comes to creating art and literature.
- BImagination helps humans make sense of space while memory helps them understand time.
- CImagination needs to be cultivated whereas memory is more intuitive because it is racial and sensory.
- DImagination is a genetic gift to humans whereas memory is central to human consciousness.
Answer: (B) Imagination helps humans make sense of space while memory helps them understand time. RC · Arts & Culture MCQ
Solution
- The passage: 'We put meaning into space by perceiving it in terms of images... With regard to time, we make connections with the help of memory.'
- So imagination handles space and memory handles time, which is option B.
- C and A describe how tribal artists use the two faculties, not what separates the faculties. D does not set the two against each other in any real way.
Question 5
Which one of the following best explains why tribals in India worship their dead ancestors?
- ATribals possess a sophisticated knowledge system that is based on memory.
- BTribals show respect to their ancestors through terracotta and carved-wood objects.
- CFor tribals, conversing with the dead becomes a way of seeking control over time.
- DTribals seek territorial domination over the spaces that they inhabit.
Answer: (C) For tribals, conversing with the dead becomes a way of seeking control over time. RC · Arts & Culture MCQ
Solution
- Tribals realised 'domination over territorial space was not their lot' and 'turned almost obsessively to gaining domination over time'.
- 'This urge is substantiated in their ritual of conversing with their dead ancestors', so the worship is a bid to control time: C.
- B describes how they worship, not why. A is a result of their sharp memory. D contradicts the passage.
Question 6
Non-human living forms exhibit human emotions in tribal narratives because tribal narratives:
- Aare rudimentary and underdeveloped.
- Babandon all rules and regulations.
- Chave a self-conscious form.
- Daccommodate existential fluidity.
Answer: (D) accommodate existential fluidity. RC · Arts & Culture MCQ
Solution
- Tribal imagination 'admits fusion between various planes of existence': oceans fly, animals speak, and stars and mountains can be angry or happy.
- This blurring of boundaries between kinds of being is 'existential fluidity', option D.
- B is directly denied ('This is not to say that tribal creations have no conventions or rules'). C is the secular mode set against tribal art. A is a judgement the author never makes.