Additional Rhetorical/Style Terms and Modes of Composition

Vocabulary flashcards covering key rhetorical and style terms, along with the major modes of composition and organizational strategies.

Analogy

Comparing two concepts revealing what is alike about them.

Enumeration

Naming off things in a list.

Metonymy

Using a word to refer to something—almost like a nickname (e.g., Crown to represent a king or queen).

Epistrophe

Repetition of words or phrases at the end of a clause or phrase (e.g., "of the people, by the people, for the people").

Polysyndeton

Repetition of words in succession (e.g., "we have ships and men and money").

Colloquialisms

An informal phrase or reference that is used for a specific dialect or region.

Paradox

Opposite terms that relay an element of truth.

Allegory

A story where characters stand for something about life or political aspects.

Compound Sentence

A sentence with more than one subject and predicate divided with a conjunction.

Antecedent

A word or phrase that represents another word (like a pronoun for a name).

Exigence

A need or demand.

Narration (Mode of Discourse)

Telling a story to recount an event with a beginning, a middle, an end, and a clear point or reason for recounting the event.

Description (Mode of Discourse)

Writing that appeals to the senses; can be direct or indirect, and either objective (scientific/clinical) or impressionistic (involving the reader's emotions or feelings).

Objective Description

A form of description that is scientific or clinical.

Impressionistic Description

A form of description that tries to involve the reader's emotions or feelings.

Spatial Organization

An organizational pattern in description based on visualizing and interpreting relationships.

Example/Exemplification

A mode in which a specific event, person, or detail of an idea (facts, statistics, personal experiences, interview quotations) is cited and developed to support or illustrate a thesis or topic.

Definition (Mode of Composition)

Identifies the class to which a specific term belongs and those characteristics which make it different from all the other items in that class.

Comparison and Contrast

A mode of composition that discusses similarities and differences.

Subject by Subject Organization

A comparison and contrast structure where Subject A is discussed in its entirety and is followed by a full discussion of Subject B.

Point by Point Organization

A comparison and contrast structure where a major point related to Subject A is examined and immediately followed with a corresponding point in Subject B.

Division and Classification

Separating items into major categories, detailing the characteristics of each group and why each member is placed in it; dividing a whole into parts or sorting related items into categories.

Causal Analysis (Cause/Effect)

Analyzing why something happens and describing the consequences of a string of events, establishing the relationship that B is the result of A.

Argumentation (Mode of Discourse)

A type of writing in which the author takes a position on a particular issue, defends it, and convinces others through reasoning.

Process Analysis

Explaining how to do something or how something happens in chronological order, with the purpose of either giving instructions or informing the reader how something is done.