| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Alliteration | repetition of initial consonant sounds |
| Allusion | A reference within literature to another piece of literature or work |
| Anadiplosis | repetition of the last word of one clause at the beginning of the next clause |
| Anaphora | repetition of a word or phrase as the beginning of successive clauses |
| Anthimeria | one part of speech, usually a verb, substitutes for another, usually a noun |
| Anticlimax | A gradual or sudden decrease in the importance or impressiveness of what is said. |
| Antimetabole | the repetition of words in successive clauses in reverse grammatical order |
| Antithesis | the juxtaposition of contrasting words or ideas to give a feeling of balance |
| Aposiopesis | breaking off suddenly in the middle of speaking, usually to portray being overcome with emotion |
| Apostrophe | a technique by which a writer addresses an inanimate object, an idea, or a person who is either dead or absent. |
| Apposition | placing side by side two coordinate elements the second of which serves as an explanation or modification of the first |
| Assonance | the repetition of similar vowels in the stressed syllables of successive words |
| Asyndeton | lack of conjunctions between coordinate phrases, clauses, or words |
| Chiasmus | reversal of grammatical structures in successive phrases or clauses |
| Climax | the highest point of anything conceived of as growing or developing or unfolding |
| Epistrophe | repetition of the same word or phrase at the end of successive clauses |
| Hyperbole | an extreme exaggeration |
| Irony | The use of words to convey a meaning that is the opposite of its literal meaning |
| Situational Irony | discrepancy between what is expected, as in action or as regards to the situation/setting, and what one wold expect to happen |
| verbal irony | occurs when what is said contradicts what is meant or thought |
| dramatic irony | (theater) irony that occurs when the meaning of the situation is understood by the audience but not by the characters in the play |
| Isocolon | parallel structure in which the parallel elements are similar not only in grammatical structure, but also in length |
| Litotes | understatement for rhetorical effect (especially when expressing an affirmative by negating its contrary) |
| Meiosis | understatement (opposite of hyperbole) |
| Metaphor | a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similarity |
| Metonymy | A figure of speech in which something is referred to by using the name of something that is associated with it |
| Oxymoron | a combination of words that seem to be contradictory |
| Paradox | a self-contradictory statement that on closer examination proves true; a person or thing with seemingly contradictory qualities |
| Parallelism | The use of identical or equivalent syntactic constructions in corresponding clauses or phrases |
| Personification | when something nonhuman is given human characteristics (must be HUMAN, or it's a metaphor) |
| Polysyndeton | deliberate use of many conjunctions--Slows down things down--The opposite of asyndeton |
| Rhetorical Question | a question asked for an effect, not actually requiring an answer |
| Simile | an explicit comparison between two things |
| Synecdoche | understanding one thing with another; the use of a part for the whole or the whole for the part |
| Zeugma | use of a word to govern two or more words though appropriate to only one |
Combine with other sets
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