Barron's Terms - List Two

AP Terms List 2

apostrophe

a locution that addresses a person or personified thing not present. ex) “oh, you cruel streets of Manhattan, how I detest you!”

arch

characterized by clever or sly humor, often saucy, playful, and somewhat irreverent.

archetype

an abstract or ideal conception of a type; a perfectly typical example; an original model or form

assonance

the repetition of two or more vowel sounds in a group of words in prose or poetry

bard

a poet; in olden times, a performer who told heroic stories to musical accompaniment

bathos

insincere or overdone sentimentality

belle-letres

a French term for the world of books, criticism, and literature in general.

bibliography

a list of works cited or otherwise relevant to a particular subject.

bombast

inflated, pretentious language.

burlesque

a work of literature meant to ridicule a subject; a grotesque imitation.

cacophony

grating, inharmonious sounds.

canon

the works considered most important in a national literature or period; works widely read and studied.

caricature

a grotesque or exaggerated likeness of striking qualities in persons and things.

carpe diem

literally, “seize the day”: “enjoy life while you can,” a common theme in life and literature.

chiasmus

using two clauses with a reversal of meaning in order to create an inverse parallel, as in this statement by Frederick Douglass: “you have seen how a man was made a slave: you shall now see how a slave was made a man.”

circumlocution

literally, “talking around” a subject; i.e., discourse that avoids direct reference to a subject.

classic

a highly regarded work of literature or other art form that has withstood the rest of time.

classical, classicism

deriving from the orderly qualities of ancient Greek and Roman culture, implies formality, objectivity, simplicity, and restraint.

clause

a structural element of a sentence, consisting of a grammatical subject and a predicate. independent clauses, sometimes called main clauses, may stand on their own as complete sentences; dependent clauses, which are used as nouns or modifiers, are incomplete sentences and cannot stand alone grammatically. dependent clauses are sometimes called subordinate clauses. dependent clauses that function as adjectives, nouns, or adverbs are know, respectively, as adjective, noun, and adverbial clauses.

climax

the high point, or turning point, of a story or play.

comparison and contrast

a mode of discourse in which two or more things are compared and contrasted. comparison often refers to similarities, contrast to differences.

conceit

a witty or ingenious thought; a diverting or highly fanciful idea, often stated in figurative language.

concrete detail

a highly specific, particular, often real, actual, or tangible detail; the opposite of abstract.

connotation

the suggested or implied meaning of a word or phrase. contrast with denotation.

consonance

the repetition of two or more consonant sounds in a group of words or a unit of speech or writing.