Architectural historians often describe the early skyscraper as an American invention enabled by the steel frame and the safety elevator. Historian Adaeze Onuoha contests this framing — not by denying the role of those technologies, but by arguing that what is distinctive about the skyscraper is less its physical possibility than the legal and financial instruments, particularly novel forms of high-rise property law, that made vertical real estate ownership economically intelligible. The skyscraper, in her account, was as much a legal artifact as a structural one.
Which choice best describes the function of the second sentence in the text?
- Acheck_circle
It accepts those technological factors but reframes the skyscraper's distinctive feature as legal and financial.
- B
It restates the conventional account using different words.
- C
It introduces a different building type.
- D
It rejects the role of steel frames and elevators in producing the skyscraper.
Explanation
Onuoha doesn't deny the technologies; she shifts the locus of distinctiveness to legal and financial instruments. B captures this subtle reframing.