Which word completes the passage so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
Cevap:In his study of ancient agricultural practices, archaeologist Liam O'Connor argues that the transition to farming in the Fertile Crescent was motivated not by a sudden climatic shift but 【by】 a gradual decline in wild food resources. According to O'Connor, early hunter-gatherers were forced to cultivate crops as their traditional foraging grounds became depleted, demonstrating that necessity, rather than choice, drove agricultural innovation.
Cevap
by
The correct answer is 'by'. The sentence uses the contrastive construction 'not [X] but [Y]' to contrast two potential causes of the agricultural transition. To maintain parallel structure, the grammatical form of both parts of the contrast must be identical. Because the first part of the contrast is a prepositional phrase introduced by the preposition 'by' ('not by a sudden climatic shift'), the second part must also be a prepositional phrase introduced by the same preposition ('but by a gradual decline').
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Anahtar Kavram
Parallel Structure with Prepositional Phrases