Language and Structural Devices Flashcards
Includes poetic and literary
What is alliteration?
Repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of words in close proximity to each other (plosive for p, fricative for f)
What is ambiguity?
When something has two or more possible meanings
What is assonance?
Repetition of the same vowel sound
What is anaphora?
Repetition of the first word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or stanzas
What is anastrophe?
Where the normal word order of a phrase is reversed
What is anadiplosis?
The repetition of the word from the end of one sentence to the start of the next, e.g. ‘Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering’
What is anthropomorphism
Attributing human characteristics to an inanimate object
What is antithesis?
When opposites are placed next to each other for effect, e.g. ‘merry and tragical’
What is bathos?
The descent of a serious tone to a commonplace and maybe funny tone in a story
What is a caesura?
A deliberate pause within a line of poetry, e.g ‘To err is human; to forgive, divine’
What is a cataphoric reference?
A pronoun which is mentioned before the noun to which it refers, e.g. ‘Where it began, I do not know’
What is colloquial language?
Ordinary, everyday language
What is a connotation?
Association evoked by a word, e.g. ‘rosy’ suggests warm and healthy
What is consonance?
Repetition of the same consonant sound in the middle or at the end of words that are near each other, e.g. ‘silent to village wells’
What is the difference between direct and indirect (reported) speech?
- Direct is the the reporting of speech by repeating the actual words of a speaker
- Indirect is the talking about past speech where tense and words are changed, e.g. ‘He said that I should come with him’
What’s the difference between declarative, interrogative and imperative sentences?
- Declarative is a statement
- Interrogative is a question
- Imperative is a command
Exclamatory is declarative which portrays strong emotion
What are dynamic verbs?
Verbs which show continued or progressive action done by the subject, e.g. ‘Jack is hitting the road’
What is a dysphemism?
When an unpleasant word is intentionally used
What is ecphonesis?
An emotional or exlamatory phrase, a common example is the letter ‘O’
What is emotive language?
Something that makes you feel a particular emotion
What is end-stopping?
Finishing a line of poetry with the end of a phrase or sentence
What is enjambment?
When a phrase or sentence runs over from one line or stanza to the next
What is a euphemism?
An indirect term for something upsetting or offensive
What is an extended metaphor?
When a metaphor continues across multiple lines/paragraphs, e.g ‘The classroom was a warzone. In a counter-offensive, Jenkins fought his way through a regiment of blotting paper missiles’
What is an eye rhyme?
Words with similar spellings but different sounds, e.g. ‘love’ and ‘move’
What is a feminine ending?
A line of poetry that ends on an unstressed syllable
What are half rhymes?
Words that have a similar, but not identical, end sound, e.g ‘shade’ and ‘said’
What is a homophone?
A word that sounds the same as another but has a different spelling or meaning, e.g ‘poor’ and ‘paw’
What is a hyperbole?
An exaggerated statement that is not meant to be taken literally
What is hypophora?
When a question is asked and then answered immeadiately after, e.g. ‘What is the meaning of life? Money, of course’