| A | B |
|---|
| Ad Hominem | An argument based on the failings of an adversary rather than on the merits of the case; a logical fallacy that involves a personal attack. |
| Adjective | The part of speech (or word class) that modifies a noun or pronoun |
| Adverb | The part of speech (or word class) that modifies a verb, adjective, or other adverb. |
| Allegory | Extending a metaphor so that objects, persons, and actions in a text are equated with meanings that lie outside the text. |
| Alliteration | The repetition of an initial consonant sound. |
| Allusion | A brief, usually indirect reference to a person, place, or event -- real or fictional. |
| Ambiguity | The presence of two or more possible meanings in any passage. |
| Analogy | Reasoning or arguing from parallel cases. |
| Anaphora | The repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or verses. |
| Antecedent | The noun or noun phrase referred to by a pronoun |
| Antithesis | The juxtaposition of contrasting ideas in balanced phrases. |
| Aphorism | (1) A tersely phrased statement of a truth or opinion. (2) A brief statement of a principle. |
| Apostrophe | A rhetorical term for breaking off discourse to address some absent person or thing. |
| Appeal to Authority | A fallacy in which a speaker or writer seeks to persuade not by giving evidence but by appealing to the respect people have for a famous person or institution. |
| Appeal to Ignorance | A fallacy that uses an opponent's inability to disprove a conclusion as proof of the conclusion's correctness. |
| Argument | A course of reasoning aimed at demonstrating truth or falsehood. |
| Assonance | The identity or similarity in sound between internal vowels in neighboring words. |
| Asyndeton | The omission of conjunctions between words, phrases, or clauses (opposite of polysyndeton). |
| Character | An individual (usually a person) in a narrative (usually a work of fiction or creative nonfiction). |
| Chiasmus | A verbal pattern in which the second half of an expression is balanced against the first but with the parts reversed. |
