figurative language/ literary devices Flashcards
allegory
a story in which people (or things or actions) represent an idea or a generalization about life. They usually have a strong lesson or moral
Alliteration
repetition of initial consonant sounds in words, such as “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”
Allusion
a reference to a familiar person, place, thing, or event.
Analogy
a comparison of objects or ideas that appear, at first, to be different but are alike in some important way.
Anapestic meter
meter that is composed of feet that are short-short-long or unaccented-unaccented-accented, usually used in light or whimsical poetry, such as a limerick.
Anaphora
a rhetorical term for the repetition of a word or a phrase at the beginning of several clauses.
Anecdote
a brief story that illustrates or makes a point.
anthropomorphism
a device in which the writer attributes human characteristics to an animate being or an inanimate object.
antithesis
a contrast or opposition between two things
aphorism
a wise saying, usually short and witty
apostrophe
a turn from the general audience to address a specific group of persons who is present or absent. EX: Hamlet turned to the audience and spoke directly to one woman about his father’s death.
archetype
a character, plot, image, theme, or setting that appears in literature across cultures and is repeated over time.
assonance
a repetition of the same sound in words close to one another. For example: white stripes.
blank verse
unrhymed verse, often occurring in iambic pentameter
cadence
the natural rhythmic rise and fall of language as it is normally spoken.
caesura
a break in the rhythm of language, particularly a natural pause in a line of verse, marked canonin prosody by a double vertical line (//).
canon
a group of literary works considered by some to be central or authoritative to the literary tradition. For example, many critics agree that the Western canon includes the literary works of Homer, Shakespeare, Hemingway, Faulkner, Dickinson, and so on.
characterization
a method an author uses to let readers know more about the characters and their personal traits.
cliche
an expression that has been used so often that it loses its expressive power, for example, “dead as a doornail” or “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.”
conceit
a metaphor or figure of speech, often elaborate, that compares two things that are very different.
consonance
repetition of the final consonant sound in words containing different vowels, for example: “stroke of luck”
couplet
a stanza made up of two rhyming lines
dactyl
a metrical foot of three syllables in which the first syllable is stressed and the next two are unstressed.
death of the author
a literary criticism that rebuts the traditional literary criticism notion that the biography of an author provides a context for interpretation of text; instead, the writing and the creator are unrelated.
denouement
the resolution or conclusion of a story.
dialect
a way of speaking that is characteristic of a certain region or social group
dialogic
a literary theory term that advances the idea that works of literature carry on a dialogue with other works of literature and other authors.
diction
an author’s choice of words based on their clarity, conciseness, effectiveness, and authenticity.
archaic
old fashioned words that are no longer used in common speech such as thee, thy, and thou.
colloquialisms
expressions that usually are accepted in informal situations or regions, such as “wicked awesome.”
dialect
a variation of a language used by people from a particular geographic area.
jargon
specialized language used in a particular field or content area.
profanity
language that shows disrespect for others or something sacred.
slang
informal language used by a particular group of people among themselves.
vulgarity
language widely considered crude, disgusting, and often, offensive.
