Rhetorical Analysis Review ^ Rhetoric Tool Box: Figurative Language

Question 1

an expression that has become ineffective through overuse (ex: “jump for joy”, ‘slow as molasses”)

Answer 1

cliché

Question 2

an expression that is habitually by a particular group of people, or with a particular meaning in a language (ex: “give them a hand”, “make up your mind”)

Answer 2

idiom

Question 3

an address to someone or something that cannot answer; a figure of speech in which an absent person or personified object is addressed by a speaker (ex: liberty)

Answer 3

apostrophe

Question 4

a figure of speech in which ideas or objects are described as having human qualities or personalities (ex: the saddened birch trees were bent to the ground)

Answer 4

personification

Question 5

a two-word paradox (ex: “Jumbo shrimp”)

Answer 5

oxymoron

Question 6

a phrase or statement that seems contradictory, but is actually true (ex: “You have to be cruel to be kind.”)

Answer 6

paradox

Question 7

explains something unfamiliar by associating it with or pointing out its similarity to something more familiar.

Answer 7

analogy

Question 8

a figure of speech in which two unlike things are compared directly usually for emphasis or dramatic effect (ex: “she lived a thorny life”)

Answer 8

metaphor

Question 9

a figure of speech that compares using the words “like” or “as” (ex: “he drank like a camel”)

Answer 9

simile

Question 10

the naming of a concept through association (ex: “a crown associated with authority”)

Answer 10

metonymy

Question 11

a part is made to represent the whole or vice versa (ex: “all hands on deck”)

Answer 11

synecdoche

Question 12

juxtaposition in balanced or paralleled structure; the direct opposite (ex: “I hope that one day my children will be judged not by their skin color, but by the content of their character)

Answer 12

antithesis

Question 13

the placement of two contrasting ideas, images, or objects together

Answer 13

juxtaposition

Question 14

a type of understatement; occurs when an affirmative is expressed by the negative of its contrary (ex: “She was not unkind.”

Answer 14

litotes

Question 15

used to soften the impact of what is being discussed (ex: “departed in lieu of dead”)

Answer 15

euphemism

Question 16

exaggeration (ex: “I’ll die if I don’t see you soon.”)

Answer 16

hyperbole

Question 17

occurs when an author assigns less significance to an event or thing than it deserves (ex: “a very destructive monsoon as ‘a bit of wind’”)

Answer 17

meiosis/understatement