25 Rhetorical Terms Flashcards
Parallelism
“So Janey waited a bloom time, and a green time, and an orange time.”
Isocolon
type of parallel structure where it is grammatically similar and in length (number of words or even syllables)
“His purpose was to impress the ignorant, to perplex the dubious, and to confound the scrupulous.”
Antithesis
juxtaposition of contrasting ideas, usually in parallel structure
“What if I am rich, and another is poor- strong, and he is weak- intelligent, and he is benighted-elevated, and he is depraved?”
Anastrophe
inversion of word order
“Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”
Paranthesis
adding a comment into a sentence (interrupts in some way)
““He said he supervised ten editors-another euphemism- in his department, which clears 90% of NBC’s entertainment programming.”
Ellipsis
Deliberate omission of a word/phrase
“And he to England shall along with you.”
Asyndeton
no conjunctions
“I came, I saw, I conquered.”
Polysyndeton
uses many conjunctions
“We lived and laughed and loved and left.”
Alliteration
repetition of first or second letters of words
“My style is Public negotiations for Parity, rather than Private negotiations for Position.”
Assonance
repetition of similar vowel sounds
“The gloves didn’t fit. If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.”
Anaphora
repetition of the same words
“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…”
Epistrophe
repetition of the same word or words at the end of a phrase
“As long as the white man sent you to Korea, you bled. He sent you to Germany, you bled. He sent you tot the South Pacific to fight the Japanese, you bled.”
Epanalepsis
repetition of words or phrases at both the beginning and ends of a sentence
“A minimum wage that is not a livable wage can never be a minimum wage.”
Anadiplosis
repetition of the last word of one clause at the beginning of the following clause
“The general who became a slave: the slave who became a gladiator.”
Climax
arrangement of words or phrases in order of increasing importance
“Miss America was not so much interested in serving herself as she was eager to serve her family, her community, and her nation.”
Antimetabole
repetition of words in successive phrases in reverse grammatical order
“One should eat to live, not live to eat.”
Chiasmus
reverse grammatical order
“It is boring to eat, to sleep is fulfilling.”
Polyptoton
repetition of words derived from the same root
“But in this desert country they may see the land being rendered useless by overuse.”
Metaphor
come on
Simile
come on
Synecdoche
part stands for the whole
The phrase “gray beard” refers to an old man.
The word “sails” refers to a whole ship.
The word “suits” refers to businessmen.
Metonymy
substitution of some attribute for what is actually meant
“The pen is mightier than the sword. (Pen refers to written words and sword to military force.)”
Antanaclasis
repetition of a word or phrase whose meaning changes in the second instance
“If we don’t hang together, we’ll hang separately.”
Personification
come on
