AP Lang. Vocabulary 1-20

Question 1

Anecdote

Answer 1

a short simple narrative of an incident often used for humorous effect to make a point.

Question 2

Argumentation

Answer 2

writing that attempts to prove the validity of a point of view or an idea by presenting “reasoned” arguments; persuasive writing is a form of argumentation .

Question 3

Allegory

Answer 3

an extended narrative of an incident prose or verse in which characters, events, and settings represent abstract qualities and in which the writer intends a second meaning to be read beneath the surface of the story; the underlying meaning can be moral, religious, political, social, or satiric.

Question 4

Annotation

Answer 4

explanatory notes the author added to a text to explain, cite sources, or give bibliographic data.

Question 5

Antithesis

Answer 5

the presentation of two contrasting images. the ideas are balanced by word, phrase, clause, or paragraphs. “to be or not to be…”, “Ask what not your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”

Question 6

Rhetoric

Answer 6

the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the use of figures of speech and other compositional techniques.

Question 7

Colloquialism

Answer 7

a word or phrase (including slang) used in everyday conversation and informal writing but that is often inappropriate in formal writing. (y’all, ain’t, can’t, somethin’)

Question 8

Connotation

Answer 8

words suggesting implied meaning because of its association in a readers mind. This is the opposite of “denotation”.

Question 9

Consonance

Answer 9

repetition of different consonant sounds with in two or more words in close proximity: boot/beat/beast/brag, or even compound words, fulfill, ping-pong.

Question 10

Caricature

Answer 10

descriptive writing that greatly exaggerates a specific feature of a persons appearance of a facet of personality.

Question 11

Coherence

Answer 11

the “quality” of a piece of writing in which all parts contribute to the development of a central idea/ theme or organization principle.

Question 12

Aphorism

Answer 12

a short, often witty, statement of a principle or truth about life. Benjamin Franklin was somewhat famous for the Poor Richard’s Almanac, e.g. “The early bird gets the worm.”

Question 13

Apostrophe

Answer 13

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.

Question 14

Cacophony

Answer 14

also referred to as dissonance…hard, awkward, or dissonant sounds used to deliberately in poetry or prose; the opposite of EUPHONY.

Question 15

Connotation/Denotation

Answer 15

1. Your take on what the word means based upon personal connections or feelings. 2. Dictionary definition of the word.

Question 16

Enumeration

Answer 16

a rhetorical device used for listing the details or a process of mentioning words or phrases step by step. In fact, it is a type of amplification or division in which a subject is further distributed into components or parts.. Writers often use this to clarify and detail understanding.

Question 17

Analogy

Answer 17

a comparison in which an idea or a thing is compared to another thing that is quite different from it. It aims at explaining that idea or thing by comparing it to something that is familiar.

Question 18

Parallelism

Answer 18

the use of components in a sentence that are grammatically the same; or similar in their construction, sound, meaning or meter. Parallelism examples are found in literary works as well as in ordinary conversations.

Question 19

Allusion

Answer 19

a brief and indirect reference to a person, place, thing or idea of a historical, cultural, literary or political significance. It does not describe in detail the person or thing to which it refers. it is just a passing comment and the writer expects the reader to possess enough knowledge to spot the allusion and grasp it.

Question 20

Metonymy

Answer 20

a figure of speech that replaces the name of a thing with the name of something else with which it is closely associated. We can come across examples of this in both literature and in everyday life. Do not confuse this with a metaphor as this is not creating a comparison.