Super cool and awesome vocab :D

Colloquialism

Informal language used in everyday conversation.

Syntax

Arrangement of words to create sentences.

Mood

Emotional atmosphere evoked by a text.

Tone

Author's attitude toward the subject matter.

Figurative Language

Language that uses literary devices, techniques, and figures of speech to heighten sensory response and add meaning, clarity, or impact to your writing

Periodic Sentence

Sentence that presents its main idea at the end.

Metaphor

Direct comparison between two unlike things.

Extended Metaphor

Metaphor developed over several lines or passages.

Analogy

Comparison between two different things for clarification and to show that they are alike.

Personification

Attributing human qualities to non-human entities.

Connotation

Implied meaning or emotional association of a word.

Denotation

Literal meaning of a word or phrase.

Oxymoron

Contradictory terms combined for effect.

Onomatopoeia

Word that imitates natural sounds.

Simple Sentence

Sentence consisting of a single independent clause.

Complex Sentence

Sentence with one independent and one dependent clause connected by a subordinate conjunction.

Compound Sentence

Sentence with two or more independent clauses connected by a semi colon or a coordinating conjunction.

Paradox

Statement that contradicts itself but reveals truth.

Concrete Language

Language that describes tangible, specific things.

Inversion

Reversal of normal word order in a sentence.

Diction

Choice of words and style of expression.

Figure of Speech

A word or phrase used in a non-literal sense for rhetorical or vivid effect.

Irony

The expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect.

Verbal Irony

Saying one thing but meaning another.

Abstract Language

Language describing ideas or concepts, not physical.

Cumulative Sentence

Sentence that begins with main idea, adds details.

Imagery

Descriptive language that appeals to the senses.

Hyperbole

Exaggerated statements not meant to be taken literally.

Understatement

Deliberate presentation of something as less important.

Alliteration

Repetition of initial consonant sounds in words.

Simile

Comparison using 'like' or 'as'.

Scansion

The rhythm of a poem; determining the rhythm of a poem

Allegory

story or poem in which characters, setting, and events stand for other people or events or for abstract ideas/qualities

Anastrophe/inversion

a literary device where the writer will rearrange the normal word order to create a new effect with the sentence, saying, or idea

Assonance

the repetition of similar vowel sounds followed by different consonant sounds, especially in words that are together

Consonance

the repetition of similar consonant sounds especially in words that are together

Didactic

form of fiction or nonfiction that teaches a specific lesson or moral or provides a model of correct behavior or thinking

Dynamic character

a character who changes in some important way as a result of the story's action

Epanalepsis

device of repetition in which the same expression (single word or phrase) is repeated both at the beginning and at the end of

Epithet

an adjective or adjective phrase applied to a person or thing that is frequently used to emphasize a characteristic quality

Existentialism

the style of literature focuses on the experience of an individual person and the way that he or she understands the world.

Expressionism

the style of art, literature, and music that uses symbols and exaggeration to represent subjective emotions, rather than representing physical reality.

Flat character

a character that has only one or two personality traits. They are one-dimensional, like a piece of cardboard. They can be summed up in one phrase.

Foil

a character who acts as contrast to another character

Gothic Lit

a style of writing that is characterized by elements of fear, horror, death, and gloom, as well as romantic elements, such as nature, individuality, and very high emotion (usually has a house in it)

Hypotaxis/Hypotactic sentence

a sentence marked by the use of connection words between clauses or sentences, explicitly showing the logical or other relationships between them

Impressionism

a nineteenth-century movement in literature and art that advocated a recording of the artist's personal impressions of the world, rather than a strict representation of reality

Jargon

special words or expressions that are used by a particular profession or group and are difficult for others to understand

Lyric poem

a poem that does not tell a story but expresses the personal feelings or thoughts of the speaker

Meter

the pattern of accented and unaccented syllables in a line of poetry

Metonymy

a figure of speech in which a person, place, or thing, is referred to by something closely associated with it

Modernism

a term for the bold new experimental styles and forms that swept the arts during the first this of the twentieth century

Motif

a recurring image, word, phrase, action, idea, object, or situation used throughout a work, unifying the works by tying the current situation to previous ones, or new ideas to the theme

Ode

a short lyric poem that praises an individual, an idea, or an event

Omniscient POV

god-like or all-knowing because the narrator has access to all aspects of the story, including each character's knowledge, thoughts, feelings, actions, and backstory

Parable

a relatively short story that teaches a moral, or lesson about how to lead a good life

Rhythm

a rise and fall of the voice produced by the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables in language

Round character

has more dimensions to their personalities - they are complex, just as real people are

Static character

one who does not change much in the course of a story

Surrealism

a movement in art and literature that started in Europe during the 1920s. They wanted to replace conventional realism with the full expression of the unconscious mind, which they considered more real than the "real" world of appearances.

Synecdoche

a figure of speech in which a part represents the whole.

Tragic hero

a character in a dramatic tragedy who has virtuous and sympathetic traits but ultimately meets with suffering or defeat

Vernacular

the language spoken by the people who live in a particular locality

Volta

a rhetorical shift that marks the change of a thought or argument in a poem

Antimetabole

repetition of words in successive clauses in reverse grammatical order

Antagonist

opponent who struggles against or blocks the hero, or protagonist, in a story

Antihero

a central character who lacks all the qualities traditionally associated with heroes. May lack courage, grace, intelligence, or moral scruples

Aside

a remark or passage in a play that is intended to be heard by the audience but unheard by the other characters in the play.

Ballad

a type of narrative poem or song that tells a story, often focusing on dramatic events or emotional themes and is in short stanzas

Chiasmus

in poetry, a type of rhetorical balance in which the second part is syntactically balanced against the first, but with the parts reversed (in prose this is called antimetabole)

Conceit

an elaborate metaphor that compares two things that are startlingly different. Often an extended metaphor

Couplet

two consecutive rhyming lines of poetry

Dialect

a way of speaking that is characteristic of a certain social group or of the inhabitants of a certain geographical area

Enjambment

a literary device in which a line of poetry continues without a pause or break into the next line

Epic

a long narrative poem, written in heightened language, which recounts the deeds of a heroic character who embodies the values of particular society

Epistrophe

devices of repetition in which the same expression is repeated at the end of two or more lines, clauses, or sentences (opposite of anaphora)

Explication

act of interpreting or discovering the meaning of a text, usually involves close reading and special attention to figurative language

Farce

a type of comedy in which ridiculous and often stereotyped characters are involved in silly, far-fetched situations

Free verse

poetry that does not conform to a regular meter or rhyme scheme

iambic pentameter

a line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable

Juxtaposition

poetic and rhetorical device in which normally unassociated ideas, words, or phrases, are placed next to one another, creating an effect of surprise and wit

Litotes

a form of understatement in which the positive form is emphasized through the negation of a negative form

Motivation

the reasons for a character's behavior

first person point of view

one of the characters tells the story

objective point of view

a narrator who is totally impersonal and objective tells the story, with no comment on any characters or events

Parody

a work that makes fun of another work by imitating some aspect of the writer's style

Pun

a "play on words" based on the multiple meanings of a single word or on words that sound alike but mean different things

Quatrain

a poem consisting of four lines, or four lines of a poem that can be considered a unit

Soliloquy

a long speech made by a character in a play while no other characters are on stage

Style

the distinctive way in which a writer uses language; a writer's distinctive use of diction, tone, and syntax

Symbol

a person, place, thing, or event that has meaning in itself and that also stands for something more than itself

Theme

the insight about human life that is revealed in a literary work

Tragedy

in general, a story in which a heroic character either dies or comes to some other unhappy end

Romanticism

a revolt against Rationalism that affected literature and the other arts, beginning in the late eighteenth century and remaining strong throughout most of the nineteenth century. It emphasized the celebration of the individual and the glorification of nature

Transcendentalism

a nineteenth century movement in the Romantic tradition, which held that every individual can reach ultimate truths through spiritual intuition, which transcends reasons and sensory experience

Naturalism

a nineteenth century literary movement that was an extension of realism and that claimed to portray life exactly as it was