Language

Front 1

Anaphora
Example: In "the ground beneath her hands." Frazier repeats Monroe "liked: in the beginning of for consecutive sentences (60).
"I want her to live. I want her to breathe. I want her to aerobicize."
(Weird Science, 1985)

Back 1

The repetition of a word or words at the beginnings of sentences.

Front 2

Anadiplosis
"Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. I sense much fear in you."
(Frank Oz as Yoda in Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menance)

Back 2

A rhetorical term for the repetition of the last word of one line or clause to begin the next.

Anadiplosis often leads to climax (see also gradatio). Note that a chiasmus includes anadiplosis, but not every anadiplosis reverses itself in the manner of a chiasmus.

Front 3

Diacope"I'm gonna cut out now with this unusual song I'm dedicating to an unusual person who makes me feel kind of unusual."

Back 3

A rhetorical term for the repetition of a word or phrase broken up by one or more intervening words. Plural diacopae or diacopes. Adjective: diacopic.

Front 4

Chiasmus

"Im stuck on band-aids and Band-Aids stuck on me"

Back 4

an inversion of the order of words or phrases when repeated or subsequently referred to in a sentence.

Front 5

Palindrome

Hannah

Back 5

A type of word play in which a word, phrase, or sentence reads the same backward or forward--such as Madam, I'm Adam. Adjective: palindromic.

Front 6

tautology

"The 'new public management' has brought new ailments, particularly tautology. You often see such phrases as 'first class organizations are those that perform excellently.'"
(David Walker, "Mind Your Language." The Guardian, Sep. 27, 2006)

Back 6

(1) A redundancy (sense #3)--in particular the needless repetition of an idea using different words. (Repetition of the same sense is tautology. Repetition of the same sound is tautophony.)

(2) In logic, a statement that is unconditionally true by virtue of its form alone; for example, "Socrates is either mortal or he's not." Adjective: tautologous or tautological.

Front 7

aphorism

"Sits he on ever so high a throne, a man still sits on his bottom."
(Montaigne)

Back 7

1. A tersely phrased statement of a truth or opinion. Adjective: aphoristic.

2. A brief statement of a principle.

Front 8

Epigraph


Life imitates art.
Oscar Wilde

I would be a Papist if I could. I have fear
enough, but an obstinate rationality prevents me.
Dr. Johnson
(epigraphs to The British Museum Is Falling Down by David Lodge, 1965)

Back 8

(1) A brief motto or quotation set at the beginning of a text (a book, a chapter of a book, an essay, a poem) to suggest its theme. Adjective: epigraphic.
(2) Words inscribed on a wall, a building, or the base of a statue.
See also: Commonly Confused Words: Epigram, Epigraph, and Epitaph.

Front 9

non sequitur


Ralph Wiggum: Martin Luther King had a dream. Dreams are where Elmo and Toy Story had a party and I was invited. Yay! My turn is over!
Principal Skinner: One of your best, Ralphie.
("The Color Yellow," The Simpsons, 2010)

Back 9

A fallacy in which a conclusion does not follow logically from what preceded it.

Front 10

conceit

"[I]t should be said that nothing objectionable appears in Heartbreak before page 10. But then: 'Here she is at her kitchen table, fingering a jigsaw of thalidomide ginger, thinking about the arthritis in her hands.'

Back 10

A literary and rhetorical term for an elaborate or strained figure of speech, usually a metaphor or simile.

Originally used as a synonym for "idea" or "concept," conceit refers to a particularly fanciful figurative device that's intended to surprise and delight readers by its cleverness and wit. Carried to extremes, a conceit may instead serve to perplex and annoy.

Front 11

anachronism

At a party once I was quite fiercely attacked by a don’s wife on the theme of “the women’s page is an anachronism.” (The Guardian)

Back 11

Anachronism (ə-năk’rə-nĭz’əm) is the placing of a person or thing out of its natural chronological or historical time. Putting a written book in a prehistoric movie, therefore, would be considered an anachronism. Notice that in poetry and other arts anachronisms can appear both deliberately and accidentally.

Front 12

apostrophe

"Blue Moon, you saw me standing alone
Without a dream in my heart
Without a love of my own."
(Lorenz Hart, "Blue Moon")

Back 12

A figure of speech in which some absent or nonexistent person or thing is addressed as if present and capable of understanding.

Front 13

allegory

"There are obvious layers of allegory [in the movie Avatar]. The Pandora woods is a lot like the Amazon rainforest (the movie stops in its tracks for a heavy ecological speech or two), and the attempt to get the Na'vi to 'cooperate' carries overtones of the U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan."
(Owen Gleiberman, review of Avatar. Entertainment Weekly, Dec. 30, 2009)

Back 13

The rhetorical strategy of extending a metaphor through an entire narrative so that objects, persons, and actions in the text are equated with meanings that lie outside the text. Adjective: allegorical.

Front 14

synesthesia

"I hear the bouncing hills
Grow larked and greener at berry brown
Fall and the dew larks sing
Taller this thunderclap spring, and how
More spanned with angles ride
The mansouled fiery islands! Oh,
Holier then their eyes,
And my shining men no more alone
As I sail out to die."
(Dylan Thomas, final verse of "Poem on His Birthday")

Back 14

In semantics and cognitive linguistics, a metaphorical process by which one sense modality is described or characterized in terms of another, such as "a bright sound" or "a quiet color." Adjective: synesthetic.

Front 15

epanalepsis

"Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice."
(The Bible, Phil. 4.4)

Back 15

(1) A rhetorical term for the repetition of a word or phrase at regular intervals: a refrain. Adjective: epanaleptic.

(2) Repetition at the end of a clause or sentence of the word or phrase with which it began: a combination of anaphora and epistrophe.

Front 16

metonymy


"Detroit is still hard at work on an SUV that runs on rain forest trees and panda blood."
(Conan O'Brien)

Back 16

A figure of speech in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated (such as "crown" for "royalty").

Front 17

synecdoche

All hands on deck.

Back 17

A figure of speech in which a part is used to represent the whole (for example, ABCs for alphabet) or the whole for a part ("England won the World Cup in 1966").

Synecdoche is often treated as a type of metonymy. Adjective: synecdochic or synecdochal.

Front 18

neologism

Plus Size

Back 18

A newly coined word, expression, or usage. Adjective: neologistic.