- Thu Feb 16, 2023 8:16 pm
#99282
Hi German.steel!
In general, when given a specific line reference, it's helpful to look at the material before and after the given line reference to understand its context better.
Here, the paragraph in which the "article of faith" language occurs begins, "With regard to the scientific objection..." That pushes back where one should look--what is the "scientific objection" mentioned at the start of this paragraph? The previous paragraph explains that this objection takes the transformation of language as "not unlike the laws of nature." Prescriptivists who try to change language from how it is actually used, the objection runs, are engaged in something like trying to defy the law of gravity, i.e., they won't succeed (in language from the first paragraph, they are "doomed to almost certain failure").
Then, the first sentence of the final paragraph call this into question. It points out that sometimes prescriptivists do succeed. On its face, this would seem to suggest that the descriptivists aren't entirely right, or at least their scientific objection isn't a knock-down objection. The next sentence just redescribes the instances in which the prescriptivists succeed in changing language as being "in accordance with the laws" of language change. In that context, the descriptivists don't give any reason for this. That is reflected in answer choice (D)--the author describes this as "article of faith" to indicate that the descriptivists who make that claim "have no proof to bolster their claim."
So the two sentences that come before the line reference seem to be the most germane and direct support for answer choice (D), but there is also important support for it in the second paragraph, and additional support in the first.