As English Linguistic Terms

Front 1

Syntax

Back 1

The way words form sentences.

Front 2

Parenthesis

Back 2

An aside within a text created by sectioning off extra information between brackets, dashes or between two commas.

Front 3

Hypophora

Back 3

When a rhetorical question is immediately followed by an answer in a text.

Front 4

Litotes

Back 4

Deliberate downplaying of things for effect.

Front 5

Parallelism

Back 5

The creation of patterns in a text, through repetition of words or phrases (phonological) or by balancing meanings (semantic) for deliberate effect.

Front 6

Pre/post-modifiers

Back 6

Pre: where the descriptive words come before the thing they are describing.

Post: where the descriptive words come after the thing they are describing.

Front 7

Extended metaphor

Back 7

When a metaphor continues throughout a text with recurring references to the compared item.

Front 8

Antithesis

Back 8

When ideas contrast or oppose one another; a semantic contrast in a text.

Front 9

Binary opposites

Back 9

Elements of a text that hold opposite ends of a notional scale, e.g. hot/cold, big/small, loud/quiet

Front 10

(A)syndetic listing

Back 10

Asyndetic: the listing of elements that excludes any form of co-ordinating conjunction.

Syndetic: the listing of elements featuring a co-ordinating conjunction.

Front 11

Consonance

Back 11

The repetition of double consonants in the middle of words, e.g. better, letter, butter

Front 12

Assonance

Back 12

The repetition of vowel sounds, e.g. wood, good

Front 13

Clipping

Back 13

Colloquial emission of parts of words to create a more casual alternative, e.g. 'cause, bra

Front 14

Rhetoric

Back 14

An example of persuasive language.

Front 15

Malapropism

Back 15

When a speaker accidentally uses the wrong word, e.g. The world's my lobster

Front 16

Semantic shift

Back 16

The shift in a word's meaning over time.

Front 17

Inverted syntax

Back 17

When the ordering of words is rearranged to create an alternative weighting to a sentence.

Front 18

Paralinguistic features

Back 18

Beyond language; the things that aid communication but don't literally constitute language, e.g. body language, facial expressions etc.

Front 19

Prosodic features

Back 19

The sound effects of spoken language, such as stress, intonation and pitch

Front 20

Back channelling

Back 20

The process of giving feedback through encouraging noises and positive comments.

Front 21

Topic markers, shifters and loops

Back 21

Marker: an utterance establishing the topic of a conversation.

Shifter: an utterance that moves a conversation onto another topic, e.g. anyway

Loop: returning to a previous topic further on in a conversation.

Front 22

Hesitation indicators

Back 22

Moments in discourse that indicate that the speaker is in some way playing for time, e.g. um, err or stuttering

Front 23

Fillers

Back 23

The insertion of words, phrases or noises into a speaker's discourse, e.g. like, y'know, right

Front 24

Latch-ons

Back 24

When a speaker takes their turn immediately after the preceding speaker has finished speaking.

Front 25

Glottal stops

Back 25

The omission of dental sounds in the middle of words like butter, letter etc.

Front 26

Non-fluency features

Back 26

Any feature which would indicate that the speaker is not speaking with fluency, e.g. stammering or inverted syntax

Front 27

Vocative

Back 27

A direct reference to another speaker in discourse.

Front 28

Elision

Back 28

The omission of a vowel or syllable in the pronunciation of a word.

Front 29

Code switching

Back 29

The ability of the speaker to alter the register of their speech to suit a different social situation.

Front 30

Anaphoric reference

Back 30

A reference back to something mentioned earlier in a text.

Front 31

Deictic expressions

Back 31

Phrases/words often referring to place (e.g. over there) or time (e.g. yesterday)

Front 32

Determiner

Back 32

A word placed in front of a noun to indicate quantity or identify the noun in some way.

Front 33

Discourse marker

Back 33

Words that indicate links or divisions between parts of discourse, e.g. 'well, anyway'

Front 34

Foregrounding

Back 34

Using word order to highlight part of a sentence.

Front 35

Oral signal

Back 35

An expressive sound such as 'mmm' or sighing

Front 36

Preposition

Back 36

A word that indicates how one thing is related to another, e.g. The book is on the table

Front 37

Sibilance

Back 37

The repetition of s, soft c, sh and z sounds.

Front 38

Subordinate clause

Back 38

A clause in a sentence that is of less importance than the main clause, and which cannot stand on its own and make sense.