| A | B |
|---|
| alliteration | repetition of initial consonant sounds |
| allusion | reference to a well-known person, place, event, etc. |
| anaphora | repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive phrases or lines |
| antagonist | the character or force that opposes the protagonist |
| antithesis | a direct contrast of structurally parallel word groupings for contrast |
| apostrophe | when a speaker directly addresses an absent person or personified quality |
| assonance | the repetition of accented vowel sounds in a series of words |
| asyndeton | the lack of conjunctions between coordinate phrases, clauses, or words |
| chiasmus | 2 corresponding pairs arranged in inverted order (a-b-b-a); second clause a reversal of first |
| consonance | repetition of consonants within a series of words |
| details | facts revealed by author or speaker that support the attitude or tone in a work |
| diction | word choice intended to convey a certain effect |
| slang | recently coined words used in informal situations |
| colloquial expressions | non-standard, often regional diction |
| jargon | words and expressions characteristic of a particular trade or pursuit |
| dialect | nonstandard subgroup of language with its own vocabulary and grammatical features, often used by writers to reveal social class |
| denotation | the exact meaning of a word, without feelings or suggestions that it may imply |
| connotation | an association that comes along with a word; not the actual meaning, but ideas or qualities implied by the word |
| figures of speech | words or phrases that describe one thing in terms of something else, not meant to be taken literally but to produce images |
| flashback | a scene that interrupts action of a work to show a previous event |
| foreshadowing | the use of hints or clues to suggest future action |
| hyperbole | deliberate exaggeration or overstatement |
| imagery | words or phrases to represent people, objects, feelings, etc. descriptively by appealing to the senses |
| irony | 3 types; in general one thing is said or happens, another is actual |
| verbal irony | when a speaker or narrator says one thing while meaning the opposite |
| situational irony | occurs when a situation turns out differently from what one would normally expect |
| dramatic irony | when a character or speaker says or does something that has different meanings from what he/she thinks, though audience knows more |
| metaphor | a comparison of two unlike things NOT using "like" or "as" |
| mood | the atmosphere or predominate emotion in a work |
| motivation | circumstance(s) that prompts a character to act in a certain way or that determines the outcome |
| narration | the telling of a story in writing or speaking |
| onomatopoeia | (imitative harmony) the use of words that mimic the sound they describe |
| oxymoron | a form of paradox that combines a pair of opposite terms into a single unusual expression |
| paradox | occurs when the elements of a statement contradict each other; it may appear illogical or absurd, but also reveals a hidden truth |
| parallelism | the use of similar or identical language, structures, or ideas in different parts of a text, arranged so that elements of equal importance are similarly phrased |
| personification | figurative language in which a nonhuman subject is given human characteristics |
| plot | the sequence of events or actions in a work |
| point of view | the perspective from which a narrative is told |
| polysyndeton | the repetition of conjunctions in a series of coordinate words or phrases |
| prosody | the study of sound and rhythm in poetry |
| protagonist | the central character of a work; stands directly opposed to the antagonist |
| pun | a play on words that are identical or similar in sound but have sharply diverse meanings, with both serious and humorous uses |
| repetition | the deliberate use of any element of language more than once |
| rhetoric | the study of language in its practical uses, focusing on persuasive effects of language and on the means to achieving those effects |
| rhetorical question | requires no answer, but is used to draw attention to a point; generally stronger than a direct statement |
| rhyme | the repetition of sounds in words or phrases that appear close to each other in a poem |
| end rhyme | occurs in a poem at the end of lines |
| internal rhyme | occurs within a line of poetry |
| slant rhyme | approximate rhyme |
| rhyme scheme | the pattern of end rhymes in a poem |
| sarcasm | the use of verbal irony in which it appears a person is praising but is actually insulting |
| setting | the time and place in which events in a work take place |
| shift/turn | a change or movement in a piece resulting from an epiphany, realization, or insight gained |
| simile | a comparison of 2 different things or ideas through the use of "like" or "as" |
| sound devices | stylistic techniques that convey meaning through sound, such as rhyme, onomatopoeia, alliteration, etc. |
| stichomythia | dialogue in which the endings and beginnings of each line echo each other, taking on a new meaning with each line |
| structure | the framework or organization of a literary selection (fiction/chapter, play/act, poem/stanza, e.g.) |
| style | a writer's distinctive mode of expression |
| suspense | the quality of a work that makes the reader or audience uncertain or tense about the outcome |
| symbol | any object, person, place, or action that has both a meaning in itself and stands for something larger |
| synecdoche | a form of metaphor in which a part of something is used to signify the whole |
| metonymy | a form of metaphor in which the name of one thing is applied to another thing with which it is closely associated |
| syntax | the arrangement of words and the order of grammatical elements in a sentence |
| theme | the central message of a literary work; the subject plus the idea the author wished to convey about it |
| tone | the writer's or speaker's attitude toward a subject, character, or audience, conveyed through diction and syntax |
| understatement | (meiosis, litotes) is the opposite of hyperbole, a kind of irony that deliberately represents something as being much less than it really is |
| voice in literature | a language style adopted by an author to create the effect of a particular speaker |
| voice in writing | the personality and distinct way of "talking on paper" that allow the reader to "hear" personality in a piece of writing |
| zeugma | two different words linked to a verb or adjective which is strictly appropriate to only one of them |
