Vocab SAT

In the early 20th century, Constantin Brancusi's sculpture Bird in Space sparked considerable debate about the definition of art. Tax authorities argued in court that the abstract sculpture, which featured a long, sleek form without any identifiable features, should not be classified as art. Brancusi ultimately won the case, but the legal battle highlighted the ______ dividing line between "art" and "manufactured object".

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?

• rigid

• unanimous

• tenuous

• straightforward

Close analysis of the painting Girl with a Flute, long attributed to the seventeenth-century Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer, has revealed subtle deviations from the artist’s signature techniques. These variations suggest that the work may be that of a student under Vermeer’s tutelage—potentially ______ our understanding of Vermeer as a solitary artist.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?

• negating

• entrenching

• substantiating

• prefiguring

While scholars believe many Mesoamerican cities influenced each other, direct evidence of such influence is difficult to ascertain. However, recent excavations in a sector of Tikal (Guatemala) unearthed a citadel that shows ______ Teotihuacan (Mexico) architecture—including a near replica of a famed Teotihuacan temple—providing tangible evidence of outside influence in portions of Tikal.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?

• refinements of

• precursors of

• commonalities with

• animosity towards

Some foraging models predict that the distance bees travel when foraging will decline as floral density increases, but biologists Shalene Jha and Claire Kremen showed that bees’ behavior is inconsistent with this prediction if flowers in dense patches are ______: bees will forage beyond patches of low species richness to acquire multiple resource types.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?

• depleted

• immature

• homogenous

• dispersed

It was comical in a way, with the dramatic irony of a farcical play. He had studied through the lens of his microscope the waste of germs and infinitesimal parasites- invisible to most- that provoke such majorities of the world’s ___________. And yet, in so focusing his view, he had failed to perceive an affliction that towered before him for fifteen years on that to others was unmistakable.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most logical word?

• A.  Happiness

• B.  Suffering

• C.  Failure

• D.  Calamities

In times of widespread economic distress, experts will sometimes turn to the outliers of a downtrend in order to study the features of their commercial, governmental, and social structures that have seemingly immunized them to financial meltdown. Recently, Sweden’s system has come under particular scrutiny due to the ____________________ of its economy throughout the recession that struck the majority of the Western world in 2007.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most precise phrase?

• A.  Relatively stable condition

• B.  Incredible crash

• C.  Loss of the value

• D.  Fragmentation

As Mendeleev assembled the table, he had noticed several gaps in the pattern of properties which- cleverly- he hypothesized to be areas held by yet undiscovered elements. Apart from reserving space on the table for these elements, he went to far as to predict not only their existence, but their ______________ as well. Several years later, the spectroscopic discovery of one of these elements- specifically gallium- and the confirmation of Mendeleev’s predictions caused the popularity of his theory to skyrocket, and the periodic table quickly became a standard fixture in the study of chemistry.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?

• A.  Chemical properties

• B.  Present locations

• C.  Findings

• D.  Theory

Once this multitude is united into a body, an offense against one of its members is an offense against the body politic. It would be even less possible to injure the body without its members feeling it. Duty and interest thus equally require the two contracting parties to aid each other ________. The individual people should be motivated from their double roles as individuals and members of the body to combine all the advantages which mutual aid offers them.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A.  Completely

• B.  Intermittently

• C.  Hesitantly

• D.  Mutually

The columns, in true Mannerist style, are without function; crowded together chaotically in the corners of the room and crushed halfway into its walls. The pilasters at the sides of the windows are unaccountably tapered- further challenging the neat verticality of classical tradition- and ________ with capitals belonging to no established style whatsoever.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A.  Carved

• B.  Found

• C.  Crowned

• D.  Felt

As a whole, the vast exhibition displays how the modernist movement progressed across the three Latin American cultures using furniture as a microcosm of the three societies. Although many might find this to be ________________ of a complex phenomenon, few can argue that the exhibition is, at least, intriguing.

Which of the following choices best completes the text with the most logical and precise phrase?

• A.  a misunderstanding

• B.  an oversimplification

• C.  a failure to display the furniture

• D.  an elaboration