Alfred Schutz analyzed the 'lifeworld'—the taken-for-granted reality of everyday experience. We navigate daily life using 'typifications'—general categories that let us treat this person as a 'customer,' that interaction as a 'greeting.' These typifications enable efficient action but can also constrain understanding when we encounter individuals who don't fit our categories. The same cognitive tools that make social life possible also shape its limitations.
The passage suggests that
typifications have no useful function in social life
everyone fits neatly into social categories
cognitive structures enabling social functioning may simultaneously create constraints
the lifeworld is fully conscious and deliberately constructed
Correct Answer: C
Choice C is the best answer. The passage explicitly states that the same tools enable and constrain.
- Context clues: Typifications "enable efficient action but can also constrain understanding."
- Meaning: Enablement and constraint are simultaneous effects of the same cognitive tools.
- Verify: "The same cognitive tools that make social life possible also shape its limitations."
💡 Strategy: When a passage presents something as having dual effects, the inference acknowledges both.
Choice A is incorrect because typifications "enable efficient action" and help us navigate. Choice B is incorrect because understanding is constrained when individuals "don't fit our categories." Choice D is incorrect because lifeworld reality is "taken-for-granted," not deliberately constructed.