The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross

Question

The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

(A) The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

(B) The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as its people; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and contains some indigenous influences.

(C) The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

(D) The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as its people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian and contains some indigenous influences.

(E) The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people with a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and some indigenous influences.

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/15/travel/tasting-the-flavors-of-uruguays-melting-pot.html

The food of Uruguay is as heterogeneous as its people: a cross mostly between Spanish and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

daagh · Accepted Answer

First point to note is that the comma denotes an element of non- essentiality; when accompanied with comma,the prepositional modifier is just an addition and no more.

Ex: Tom and Dick played the lead roles, with Harry as the cameo – Here -with Harry plays small role –If you are concerned about the roles of Tom and Dick principally, then this use is correct'.

Now consider the other side: Tom and Dick played the lead roles with Harry as the cameo; Here there is a subtle meaning change; Now all the three are essential to the play, no less than the others. So it is the context that ultimately decides.

Preceded by a comma, ‘with’ clears certain misconceptions.

The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s  people with a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian ; here the prepositional modifier straightway modifies people leading to absurd meaning. So in such cases, we do have to use ‘with, accompanied by a comma before.
 
The take-away therefore is that evaluating context is a vital requirement of the use of ‘with’

VeritasPrepBrian · Answer

One really subtle but totally-GMAT flaw with choice A (and that took me forever to see) is that word "its" in "like its people". Your mind is conditioned to just *know* that it means Brazil, but the subject of the sentence *is* "the food", so you're definitely dealing with two singular nouns in the first four words, so "its" has an unclear referent.

To me one of the biggest takeaways from this question is "make all the decisions you're great at first" - if it's a pronoun, a modifier, or a verb (either tense or agreement), you have an excellent chance of making the right decision. With strange modifiers and idiomatic expressions - including things like "is it okay to use like here?" and "what's the proper usage of comma-with" - we all struggle from time to time, and often the GMAT is just setting a "smokescreen" to distract you from a much more concrete, binary error. I'll admit - on this one I was trying to figure out some strange-usage decisions in the back half of the sentence until the author of the question laughed and said "I knew you'd overlook that pronoun its".

Word to the wise - whenever there's a common decision to be made (and I'm big on MVP first - Modifiers, Verbs, Pronouns) - see if you can make that decision first before you get too deep in a much trickier application of grammar.

akashb106 · Answer

A.The food of Brazil,  like its  people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.----  Incorrect, I feel the use of As would be better.  
B.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  its  people;  it  is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and contains some indigenous influences.---  The first its is confusing, We do not know if it refers to food or Brazil. The second it could again refer to food or people 
C.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the  country’s people:  a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian , with  some indigenous influences.--- CORRECT
D.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  its  people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian and  contains  some indigenous influences.---  Its again could refer to food or Brazil. Also people cannot contain indigenous influences. This sentence is illogical.  
E.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  the country’s people with a cross mostly  between Portuguese and Italian, and some indigenous influences.---  I think this sentence changes meaning. It is trying to say that the food of brazil is as heterogeneous as the country's people with a cross mostly between ....

maaadhu · Answer

can someone help me explain the use of "with"

a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

Here the statement after comma followed by word "with" is correct.

However, I saw GMAT sentences that marked such statements as incorrect.

Any experts can help me explain why some statements with " "comma" followed by the word "with" is correct and why some are not.

PiyushK · Answer

I am bit confused here, who is cross between Portuguese and Italian? is it food or people. 
Original sentence says food is a cross between Portuguese and Italian.

In option C. country's people are placed right before explanation after colon and here it changing the meaning, is it right ?
the country’s people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

JusTLucK04 · Answer

I see only one logical referent for Its...can you elaborate on how is it ambiguous?

VeritasPrepBrian · Answer

"Its" is probably more "dead wrong" than ambiguous, actually. Because the subject of the sentence is "the food", with "of Brazil" as a prepositional phrase telling us more about "which food", then "its" refers to "the food". But food doesn't have people that a country does! My point with even mentioning the "unclear" reference there is that your mind almost naturally processes it as "Brazil's people" because "the food's people" is so illogical. But when you look at what the sentence really says, "its" means "the food's".

JusTLucK04 · Answer

Ohh..this was a tough one..I doubt If I will be able to spot such errors on the GMAT even after practicing this or more similar ones...it is just too small for the naked eye I can say.. :-D

vipulgoel · Answer

The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

MY reasoning to omit the OA was , I couldn't
 find the acting verb after the colon , in order to make the whole part after colon IC2

rohitkumar77 · Answer

The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.

A.The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.
B.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as its people; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and contains some indigenous influences.
C.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.
D.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as its people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian and contains some indigenous influences.
E.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people with a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and some indigenous influences.

for C - in case of colon watever you need to modify it should be placed closest to it ; IN C it seems the people is a cross ; 
Well in this case both B and C is wrong then .

daagh · Answer

Let us deal with a few important aspects of the use of a colon.
1.
vipulgoel wrote:

Quote:

MY reasoning to omit the OA was , I couldn't find the acting verb after the colon , in order to make the whole part after colon IC2

A. It is imperative that what is said before the colon is a complete sentence. B. What comes after that colon need not be a clause; only thing is that the second part should be related to the first and should define or complement the first part. However, it is not necessary that the second part should be an independent clause with a verb of its own.

For a clear perception of this tenet of grammar please vast this link.

https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/educat ... mar/colons

2.
Rohitkumar wrote

Quote:

For C - in the case of a colon, whatever you need to modify it should be placed closest to it; In C it seems the people is a cross; Well in this case both B and C is wrong then.

In C, the phrase that follows the colon is an absolute modifier like an adverbial modifier, modifying the subject of the previous clause and its verb. Therefore, the 'cross' does refer to the food and it being a hybrid of Portuguese and Italian cuisines. More importantly, proximity is an eligible contender only after logic. You do not expect all the people of Brazil today to be a cross between Portuguese and Italians; at least, Brazil was a colony of Portugal, but Italy never laid its hand on Brazil; the worst connotations is the phrase, ‘with some local influence’. It is too much to infer that the contemporary people of Brazil are a three way cross between Portugal, Italy, and the locals. So have no doubts, the reference of a cross is indeed pointing to the food. We may see that it is befitting to take a regional cuisine as a multiple amalgam. So, what follows after a colon need not necessarily refer to the factor just before.

EducationAisle · Answer

The use of  like  actually seems to be fine here.

Prateek176 · Answer

GMATNinja  ,  MartyMurray  ,  VeritasKarishma

I still have a confusion despite the above explanations.

Why is "its" in A and B unclear. its may have 2 referants: Food and Brazil. We can't say "food's people" so by default the "its" must refer to "brazil". Why can't a pronoun refer to a noun inside a prepositional phrase. Please help!!!!

GMATNinja · Answer

In general, the best way to handle pronouns on the GMAT is to start by being strict and literal. In theory, "its" could refer to either "Brazil" or "food", so this is arguably a case of pronoun ambiguity. And given the choice, I suppose it's clearer to say "the country's people" than "its people."

In practice, though, I don't think it's a big deal in this case. The potential ambiguity in (A) and (B) doesn't really cause much confusion, since "Brazil" is the closest singular noun to "its." More importantly, pronoun ambiguity isn't an absolute rule on the GMAT. More on that issue in  this video .

And please also keep in mind that the GMAT spends thousands of dollars developing each individual GMAT question, and even the very best test-prep companies can't possibly compete with that. So don't overthink this particular issue in this particular question, since there's a lot of nuance to the way that the GMAT actually handles pronoun ambiguity.

I hope this helps!

Helium · Answer

Difficult one :

The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences .

A.The food of Brazil, like  its  people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences. -  Pronoun ambiguity  ( food's people ...really?)

B.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  its  people; it is a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and contains some indigenous influences.- Pronoun ambiguity

C. The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as the country’s people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, with some indigenous influences.  - Correct

D.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  its  people: a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian and contains some indigenous influences.- Pronoun ambiguity

E.The food of Brazil is as heterogeneous as  the country’s people with a cross mostly between Portuguese and Italian, and some indigenous influences .-Nonsensical

KarishmaB · Answer

As Brian mentioned in his comment above, it is not really a case of ambiguous antecedent but rather incorrect antecedent.

The food of Brazil, like its people ...

"of Brazil" is a modifier for "food". We don't "carry it" along, so to say, to the other side of like. So when we say "like its people", we are talking about food here. This is problematic.

globaldesi · Answer

'
Are ":" allowed to refer independent sentences. Shouldn't option "C" have ";" instead of ":"

Nups1324 · Answer

"WOW" - This is what I uttered went I realised it. This was something amazing. It's deadly subtle. I got into the trap. I thought the repetition of "country" is redundant when A has a pronoun. Good question. I really liked your explanation..very well explained. Thank you.

Posted from my mobile device

kittle · Answer

Amazing catch. I think all miss that.

The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross

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The food of Brazil, like its people, is heterogeneous; it is a cross

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