A.p English Vocabulary- Literary Terms.

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Abstract/Concrete language

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-abstract language names concepts or qualities that cannot be directly seen
or touched: love, hate, emotion, etc. Concrete language denotes objects or qualities that can be perceived
by the senses: pencil, shouting, stinky, leaky. The observable or physical is usually described in concrete
language. Abstract words are sometimes needed to express ideas, but they are vague unless used with
concrete supporting detail.

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Alliteration

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- A scheme using the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of two or more
adjacent words: Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Final Four, Sweet Sixteen.

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Allusion

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- A reference to a well-known person, place or thing from literature, history, etc. It evokes a
vivid impression in very few words: Eden, Scrooge, Prodigal son, Mother Theresa.

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Anaphora

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- Repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences in a row.
This is a deliberate form of repetition and helps make the writer's point more coherent:
"We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on
the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air..."
Winston Churchill
"So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the
mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the Alleghenies of Pennsylvania..."
Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Anecdote

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- A short, simple narrative of an incident; often used for humorous effect or to make a point.

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Antithesis

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- The presentation of two contrasting images. The ideas are balanced by word, phrase, clause,
or paragraphs:
"To be or not to be..." Shakespeare, Hamlet
"Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country..." Kennedy

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Aphorism

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- A short, often witty statement of a principle or a truth about life:
"The early bird gets the worm."
"What goes around comes around"

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Apostrophe

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- Usually in poetry but sometimes in prose; the device of calling out to an imaginary, dead,
or absent person or to a place, thing, or personified abstraction:
"For Brutus, as you know, was Caesar's angel/Judge, O you god, how dearly Caesar loved him."
Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

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Argumentation

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- Writing that attempts to prove the validity of a point of view or an idea by presenting
reasoned argument; persuasive writing is a form of argumentation

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Assonance

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- Repetition of vowel sounds between different consonants: neigh/fade

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Assumption

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- An opinion, a perspective, or a belief that a writer of speaker thinks the audience holds

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Asyndeton

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- Commas used (with no conjunction) to separate a series of words. The parts are emphasized
equally when the conjunction is omitted; in addition, the use of commas with no intervening conjunction
speeds up the flow of the sentence. Asyndeton takes the form of X, Y, Z as opposed to X, Y, and Z:
"Be one of the few, the proud, the Marines"
"...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the
earth." Lincoln

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Audience

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- The people "listening" to the author's words and are capable of responding to it. Writers
sensitive to their audience will carefully choose a tone, examples, and allusions that their readers will
understand and respond to.

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Cacophony

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- Harsh awkward, or dissonant sounds used deliberately in poetry or prose; the opposite of
euphony:
"His fingers rapped and pounded the door, and his foot thumped against the yellowing wood."

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Caricature

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- Descriptive writing that greatly exaggerates a specific feature of a person's appearance or a
facet of personality.

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Causal chain

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- A sequence of events in which one event causes another event, which in turn causes yet
another event

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Chronological order

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- The time sequence in which events occur

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Classification and Division

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- The pattern of development that uses these two related methods of
organizing information; classification involves searching for common characteristics among various items
and grouping them together accordingly, thereby imposing order on randomly organized information;
division breaks up an entity into smaller groups or elements; classification generalizes; division specifies.

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Cliché

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- An overused expression: "the good die young."

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Climax

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- A scheme with the repetition of words, phrases, or clauses in order of increasing number or
importance:
"Excellent athletes need to be respectful of themselves, their teammates, their schools, and their
communities."

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Coherence

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- The tight relationship between all the parts of an effective piece of writing; such a
relationship ensures that the writing will make sense to the reader.

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Colloquialism

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- A word or phrase, including slang, used in every day conversation and informal writing
but that is often inappropriate in formal writing; y'all, ain't, bro

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Comparison and Contrast

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- The pattern of development that focuses on similarities and differences
between two or more subjects.

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Connotation

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- Implied or suggested meaning of a word because of its association in the reader's mind.

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Context

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- The convergence of time, place, audience, and motivating factors in which a piece of writing or
a speech is situated.

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Denotation

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- The literal meaning of a word; the dictionary definition

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Description

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- The picturing in words or someone or something through detailed observation of color,
motion, sound taste, smell, and touch; a mode of discourse

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Dialect

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- The describable patterns of language-grammar and vocabulary- used by a particular cultural or
ethnic population.

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Diction

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- Word choice, an element of style; it creates tone, attitude, style, and meaning. Different types
and arrangements of words have significant effects on meaning and can be viewed on different scales of
formality/informality, concreteness/abstraction, Latinate derivation/Anglo-Saxon derivation, and
denotative value/connotative value.

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Didactic

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- Writing whose purpose is to instruct or teach. The work is usually formal and focuses on
moral or ethical concerns. This type of writing may be fiction or nonfiction that teaches a specific lesson
or moral or provides a model of correct behavior or thinking

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Discourse

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- Spoken or written language, including literary works; the four traditionally classified modes
of discourse are description, exposition, narration, and argumentation or persuasion.

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Epigraph

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- The use of a quotation at the beginning of a work that hints at its theme. Hemmingway
begins The Sun Also Rises with two quotations. One is by Gertrude Stein, "You are all a lost generation."

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Epistrophe

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- A scheme with the repetition of a word or expression at the end of successive phrases,
clauses, or sentences, especially for rhetorical or poetic effect.
"When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child"
"...of the people, by the people, for the people" Lincoln

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Ethical Appeal - Ethos

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- When a writer tries to persuade the audience to respect and believe him or her
based on a presentation of image of self through the text. Reputation is sometimes a factor in this type of
appeal, but in all cases the aim is to gain audience confidence.

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Euphemism

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- A more acceptable and usually more pleasant way of saying something that might be
inappropriate or uncomfortable:
"He went to his final reward" (died)
"collateral damage" (military uses to indicate civillian deaths)

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Euphony

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- A succession of harmonious sounds used in poetry or prose; the opposite of cacophony:
"cellar door" is reportedly the most pleasant sounding phrase in the English language. Note that
cacophony and euphony are highly subjective.

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Example

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- An individual instance taken to be representative of a general pattern. A concrete, specific
illustration of a general point.

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Extended analogy

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- A sustained comparison, often referred to as a conceit

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Figurative language

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- Language that contains figures of speech such as similes, metaphors,
personification, in order to create associations that are imaginative rather than literal; imaginative
language used to suggest a special meaning or create a special effect.

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Flashback/Flashforward

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- A part of the plot that moves back in time and then returns to the present
(analepsis; a part of the plot that jumps ahead in time and returns to the present (prolepsis).

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Genre

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- A piece of writing classified by type - for example, letter, narrative, editorial, poem; there are
also subgenres such as science fiction or sonnet within the larger genres.

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Hyperbole

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- A deliberate exaggeration for emphasis or humorous effect; the opposite of hyperbole is
understatement:
"He was so hungry he could have eaten a horse."

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Imagery

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- Words or phrases that use a collection of images to appeal to one or more of the five senses in
order to create a mental picture.

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Irony

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- A situation or statement in which the actual outcome or meaning is opposite to what is expected:

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verbal irony

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- characterized by a gap between what is stated and what is really meant, which
often has the opposite meaning: "his humble abode," referring to a millionaire's estate.

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situational irony

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- points to a discrepancy between what actually happens and what readers
expect to happen: a character, trying to frighten a rival, end up more frightened himself.

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dramatic irony

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- occurs when the reader understands more about what is happening in a story
than the character who is telling the story: a narrator might tell an anecdote that he intends to
illustrate how clever he is, while it is obvious to the reader from the story's events that the
narrator has made a fool of himself.

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Jargon

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- The specialized vocabulary of a particular group or profession. The term usually has pejorative
associations, with the implication that jargon is evasive, tedious, and unintelligible to outsiders. The
writings of a lawyer and literary critic are both susceptible to jargon.

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Litotes

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- Understatement, a trope which uses deliberate playing down of a situation in order to make a
point: "not bad" as a way of saying "good" or "you are not wrong" as a way of saying "correct."

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Logical Appeal - Logos -

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The appeal of a text based on the logical structure of its argument or central
ideas. Includes facts, statistics, examples, well-reasoned arguments, etc.

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Metaphor

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- A figure of speech in which one thing is referred to as another: my love is a fragile flower

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Metonymy

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- A figure of speech that uses the name of an object, person, or idea to represent something
with which it is associated: "the crown" refers to a monarch or "the pen is mightier than the sword."

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Mode

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- The method or form of a literary work; the manner in which a work of literature is written; There
are four modes of discourse: argumentation, description, exposition, narration.

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Mood

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- Similar to tone; it is the primary emotional attitude of a work (the feeling of the work; the
atmosphere). Syntax is also a determiner of this term because length, sentence length, and complexity
affect pacing

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Narration

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- The telling of a story in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, or drama; one of the four modes of
discourse.

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Objectivity/Objective description

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- An impersonal presentation of events and characters; it is a writer's
attempt to remove himself/herself from any subjective, personal involvement in a story. Hard news
journalism is prized for its objectivity, although fictional stories can be written without a writer rendering
personal judgment.

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Onomatopoeia

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- A trope or figure of speech in which the sound of a word is related to its meaning:
"buzz," "moan," "boom."

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Oxymoron

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- A trope or figure of speech consisting of juxtaposed or contradictory words or phrases:
"jumbo shrimp," "bitter-sweet," "wise fool."

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Pacing

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- the movement of a literary piece from one point or section to another.

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Paradox

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- A statement that seems to contradict itself but that turns out to have a rational meaning:
"I never found thee companion that was so companionable as solitude," Henry David Thoreau

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Parallelism

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- The technique of arranging words, phrases, clauses, or larger structures by placing them
side by side and making them similar in form. Parallel structure may be as simple as listing two or three
modifiers in a row to describe the same noun or verb; it may take the form of two or more of the same
type of phrases (prepositional, participial, gerund, appositive) that modify the same noun or verb; it may
take the form of two or more subordinate clauses that modify the same noun or verb; or it may be a
complex blend of a sing word, phrase, and clause parallelism all in the same sentence:
"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields".
Churchill

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Parenthesis

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- An insertion of material that interrupts the typical flow of a passage in order to provide
necessary, on-the-spot information to readers:
"Sports night at the school always brings out the would-be jocks-who would expect any different-
ready to show that they're potentially as good as the varsity players."

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Parody

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- A work that ridicules the style of another work by imitating and exaggerating its elements; it
can be utterly mocking or gently humorous. It depends on allusion and exaggerates and distorts the
original style and content.

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Pathos-Emotional appeal-

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The appeal of a text to the emotions or interests of the audience. An element
evoking pity or compassion; over-emotionalism can be the result of excess pathos.

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Periphrasis

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- The substitution of a descriptive word or phrase for the proper name; used to suggest a
personality characteristic: The Big Apple as a way of saying New York City.

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Periodic sentence

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- A sentence with modifying elements included before the verb and/or complement;
the main meaning is found toward the end of the sentence.

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Persona

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- Generally, the speaker (the "I") in any first-person narrative or poem; although the persona
often serves as the "voice" of the author, it nonetheless should not be confused with the author, for the
persona may not accurately reflect the author's personal opinions, feelings, or perspective on a subject.

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Personification

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- A figure of speech which gives inanimate objects human characteristics: the chair
slouched

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Persuasion

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- The method by which a writer moves an audience to adopt a belief or follow a course of
action; language intended to convince through appeals to reason or emotion.

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Polysyndeton

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- a sentence which uses "and" or another conjunction, with no commas, so separate the
items in a series. Polysyndeton appear in the form of X and Y and Z, stressing equally each member of a
series. It makes the sentence slower and the items more emphatic than in asyndeton.

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Purpose

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- The writer's reason for writing; what the writer hopes to achieve with the text: to clarify, to
inform, to convince, and/or to persuade; also called aim and intention.

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Repetition

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- words or phrases used two or more times in close proximity to emphasize meaning or
achieve effect

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Rhetoric

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- The art of analyzing all the choices involving language that a writer, speaker, reader or listener
might make in a situation so that the text becomes meaningful, purposeful, and effective; the specific
feature of texts written or spoken that cause them to be meaningful, purposeful, and effective for readers
or listeners in a situation.

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Rhetorical question

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- a question posed by the speaker or writer for effect without intent to be answered;
it is used to pose an idea to be considered by the speaker or audience.

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Sarcasm

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- Harsh, caustic personal remarks to or about someone; less subtle than irony

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Satire

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- a work that reveals a critical attitude toward some element of human behavior by portraying it in
an extreme way; it doesn't simply abuse or get personal, as in sarcasm. It targets groups or large concepts
rather than individuals.

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Scheme

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- An artful variation from typical formation and arrangement of words or sentences; parallelism,
antithesis, parenthesis, appositive, ellipsis, asyndeton, alliteration, assonance, anaphora, epistrophe, and
climax.

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Simile

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- A figure of speech that uses like, as, or as if to make a direct comparison between two essentially
different objects, actions, or qualities: The sky looked like an artist's canvas.

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Speaker

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- The voice of a work; an author may speak as himself or herself or as a fictitious personal.

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Style

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- An author's characteristic manner of expression-his/her diction, syntax, imagery, structure, and
content all contribute to style

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Subjective description or Subjectivity

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- a description that contains value judgments; whereas objective
language is distanced from an event or object; a subjective description focuses on the author's reaction the
event, conveying not just an actual record of details but also their significance; subjective language may
include poetic or colorful words that impart a judgment or an emotional response; a personal presentation
of events and characters influenced by the author's feelings and opinion.

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Symbolism

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- The use of symbols or anything that is meant to be taken both literally and as a
representative of a higher and more complex significance.

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Synecdoche

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- A trope or figure of speech in which a part of something is used to refer to the whole thing:
"boards" to mean a stage or "wheels" to mean a car.

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Syntax

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- The grammatical structure of a sentence; the arrangement of words in a sentence: It includes
length of sentences, kinds of sentences (questions, exclamations, declarative, rhetorical questions, simple,
compound, complex, etc).

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Theme

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- The central idea or message of a literary work

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Tone

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- the characteristic emotion or attitude of an author toward the characters, subjects, and audience:
anger, sarcastic, loving, didactic, emotional.

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Transition

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- a word or phrase that links one idea to the next and carries the reader from sentence to
sentence, paragraph to paragraph.

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Trope

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- An artful variation from expected modes of expression of thoughts and ideas; one of the two
major divisions of figures of speech (the other being rhetorical figures); to trope is to turn or twist some
word or phrase to make it mean something else: metaphor, simile, personification, synecdoche,
metonymy, periphrasis, onomatopoeia, hyperbole, understatement/litotes, irony, oxymoron, and zeugma

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Understatement

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- The opposite of exaggeration; it is a technique for developing irony and/or humor
where one writes or says less than intended (litotes).

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Unity

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- The sense that a text is, appropriately, about only one subject and achieves one major purpose or
effect; quality of a piece of writing.

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Voice

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- Refers to different areas of writing: One refers to the relationship between a sentence's subject
and verb (active and passive voice); the other refers to the total "sound" of a writer's style.

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Zeugma

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- A trope or figure of speech in which one word, usually a noun or the main verb, governs two
other words not related in meaning:
"He maintained his business and his innocence."
"She made her breakfast and the bed."