Despite the increasing number of women graduating from law school and

Hi

Let me try to address your query.

In several sentence structures which use a list form, such as option (C) here, it helps to think of it as a mathematical expression with parentheses. Expanding the parentheses will imply application of the structure outside the parentheses to each of the items in the list within the parentheses.

For example:

At the next meeting, the company directors will (assess the yearly plan, discuss the compensation policy, and make a final decision regarding closure of the Bosnian operations).

At the next meeting, the company directors (will assess the yearly plan, will discuss the compensation policy, and will make a final decision regarding closure of the Bosnian operations).

Both the above structures are correct, and the portion outside the parentheses will be applied to each of the portions within.

Similarly, we can look at answer option (C) as follows:

Despite the increasing number of women graduating from law school and passing bar examinations, the proportion of (judges and partners at major law firms) who are women has not risen comparably.

Upon expansion, the modifier "who are women" will be applicable to both "judges" and "partners at major law firms".

Hope this helps.

In option C : " judges and partners at major law firms who are women". As per my view ""who should refer to firms. I am a bit confused .. can any1 please clarify.

Hi anilgmat10,

That is not correct. The who refers to judges and partners.
... judges and partners at major law firms who are women...

Do you feel that the who is ambiguous, or do you feel that it is wrong?

AjiteshArun
GMATNinja
I've read so many official SC, but I did not find an SC where 'who' did not modified it's touching noun!
Can I think that 'who' has modified the whole noun phrase (judges and partners at major law firms) rather than only 'judges and partners'?
eagerly waiting for your response.
Appreciating your help.
Thanks__

Hi TheUltimateWinner,

IIRC GMATNinja has a whole thread on the issue, so you may want to take a look at that. As for your question, yes, the who refers to the noun phrase (judges and partners at major law firms). The main point is that it doesn't refer to major law firms.

Hi TheUltimateWinner
Please refer below quote

egmat

Hi Shraddha,

Isn't it "the proportion of judges and partners" expressing the fraction /quantity? Example: Some of the stones, some of the apples
Selected the option having the SV error, considering "the proportion of judges and partners" is expressing the fraction and therefore acting as subject.

Despite the increasing number of women graduating from law school and passing bar examinations,the proportion of judges and partners at major law firms who are women has not risen comparably
<Phrase >, <Subject> <verb >


The proportion = subject --> singular verb

GMATNinja How do we know whether both partners and judges are women or just the judges are women? What I mean to state is, how do we differentiate between:
(i) (judges and partners at major law firms) who are women; and
(ii) judges and (partners at major law firms who are women)

The first thing to notice is that we run into a similar problem in each of the five answer choices.

In (B) and (D), you could ask, "Does women modify judges only? Or both judges and partners?" This potential "issue" can't be avoided, so we don't really need to worry about it!

That said, the word "proportion" is the main clue. It wouldn't really make sense to talk about (1) the proportion of partners at major law firms who are women and (2) the proportion of judges. The first item is okay because the proportion is clearly the # of partners who are women compared to the total # of partners. But what about the second item? What proportion are we talking about? What are we comparing the # of judges to?

It makes much more sense to talk about (1) the proportion of partners at major law firms who are women and (2) the proportion of judges who are women. Clearly, we're interested in the # of women partners/judges compared to the total # of partners/judges. And any other interpretation wouldn't really make sense given the context ("Despite the increasing number of women graduating from law school and passing bar examinations...").

Can you technically interpret the sentence either way? I suppose. But, given the context, your second interpretation is a heck of stretch. And since we run into the same thing in all five choices, this can't be a decision point at all.

I hope that helps!

"the proportion of judges and partners at major law firms who are women have not risen to a comparable extent."

Here "who" refers to "judges and partners at major law firms" and not "major law firms" because "who" refers to person and "major law firms" is a non-human term.

But in one of the diagnostic test questions (no. 97),

"As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro . "

the "who" refers to "American theater" because the relative pronouns refer to nouns or pronouns immediately preceding it as the official guide says.

But if we follow the same logic from the first question, "who" can't refer to non-human terms and hence must refer to the person "Stella Adler". what am I missing here ?

If this is what the official guide says, I would disagree with it.

who cannot refer to American theater.

The issue in that sentence is that the closest logical target noun for the Relative Clause beginning with “who” is the noun “artists”

And it would be illogical to say the “artists” trained themselves. (In the context of the sentence, Stella Adler trained the artists ———> among those artists she trained are DeNiro and Brando. If “who” referred to artists, then you’d have an illogical scenario in which the artists trained themselves).

Therefore, in the context of that sentence, the nonrestrictive modifier is meant to refer to Stella Adler: she is the woman “who trained several generations of actors.”

However, look at all the phrases we have that intervene between the target noun “Stella Adler” and the Relative Pronoun “who” in addition to the prepositional phrase:

“one of the most influential artists” ——->subject complement following the linking verb


“was” ——-> the main verb of the sentence

If I remember correctly, there were much better choices that conveyed the meaning much more clearly.



Posted from my mobile device

My approach:
Step 1: Scan the answers and spot the 'yet' and change in 'comparable extent' at the end of the modifier
Note - this is a comparison and efficiency test
Step 2: Read the sentence - spot the proportion of women "have not" error . . . read complete sentence
Step 3: eliminate all the proportion "have" - the idiom is "proportion "has not". Therefore eliminate A and B.
Step 4: note the "yet" in D and E. This is redundant as the sentence already starts with 'despite'. That leaves C.
Step 5: read C again with complete sentence to make sure the answer corrects the idiom and is parallel

KarishmaB GMATNinja
Hello Experts,
Yet is generally used to show contrast. I read other usages of "Yet" described in Cambridge dictionary.
For example - Yet (means still; until the present time): He hasn't finished yet.
Why we can't consider yet as an adverb in D?

Appreciating your help!

Hello Sneha2021,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, in Option E "yet" modifies the entire clause "the proportion of judges and partners at major law firms who are women has not risen comparably", not just the verb phrase "has not risen", meaning it is not an adverb.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Hi Sneha2021,

Yet as an adverb meaning ~"until now" will typically be found towards the end.
1. He has not finished yet. ← As of now, he hasn't finished.

We can make this slightly more formal by moving yet to the middle.
2. He has not yet finished. ← No change in meaning (as of now, he hasn't finished).

But can we move it to the front of the sentence?
3. Yet he has not finished. ← Now we see the ~contrast meaning instead of ~"until now".

On the GMAT, if we want (3), we'd have to go for something like {clause}, yet {clause} or {clause}, {another conjunction like and} yet {clause}.
4. He's been at it the whole day, yet he hasn't finished. ← conjunction, contrast
or
5. He's been at it the whole day, and yet he hasn't finished. ← adverb, contrast

Effectively, we don't normally expect to see yet before a clause unless we're looking at using yet as a conjunction between two clauses or as an adverb after another conjunction between two clauses. In option D, we see {prepositional phrase}, yet {clause}. Apart from the fact that yet is redundant here (because despite is present in the nonunderlined portion), we can't use yet in that position (in front of the clause).