|Question 5Verbal

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Text
Alternative-history fiction is a subgenre of science fiction in which plots center on "what if?" questions. What if India had started the Industrial Revolution? What if Soviet cosmonauts had been first to land on the moon? Speculative counterfactuals like these can be great fodder for stories, but they're also commonly deployed by academic historians to better understand factors influencing historical events. Well-realized and coherent alternative-history stories can thus complement historians' speculations about the past.
Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?
It provides examples of the types of scenarios addressed in alternative-history fiction.
A
It illustrates how academic historians have influenced writers of alternative-history fiction.
B
It indicates specific ideas that were first raised by writers of alternative-history fiction and that subsequently inspired scholarship by academic historians.
C
It acknowledges counterfactual questions that academic historians have largely overlooked.
D