Rhetorical Terms #5

Goldsmith AP Lang

litotes

Understatement---for example, "Her performance ran the gamut of emotion from A to B."

logic

The art of reasoning.

logos

The appeal of a text based on the logical structure of its argument or central ideas

loose sentence

A sentence that adds modifying elements after the subject, verb, and complement.

metonymy

An entity referred to by one of its attributes or associations-for example, "The admissions office claims applications have risen."

mnemonic device

A systematic aid to memory.

mood

The feeling that a text is intended to produce in the audience.

narrative intrusion

A comment that is made directly to the reader by breaking into the forward plot movement.

oxymoron

Juxtaposed words with seemingly contradictory meanings-for example,"jumbo shrimp.

paradox

A statement that seems untrue on the surface but is true nevertheless

parallelism

A set of similarly structured words, phrases, or clauses that appears in asentence or paragraph. Parallelism is the repetition of grammatical elements in a pieceof writing to create a harmonious effect.

pathos

The appeal of a text to the emotions, values, or interests of the audience

periodic sentence

A sentence with modifying elements included before the verb_verb and/or complement.

periphrasis

The substitution of an attributive word or phrase for a proper name, or the use of a proper name to suggest a personality characteristic.

persona

The character that a writer or speaker conveys to the audience

purpose

The goal a writer or speaker hopes to achieve with the text-for example, to clarify difficult material, to inform, to convince, and/ or persuade. Also called aim and intention.

recursive

Referring to the moving back and forth from invention to revision in the process of writing

refutation

the part of a speech in which the speaker would anticipate objections to the points being raised and counter them

repetition

a text repeated use of sounds, words, phrases, or clauses to emphasize meaning or achieve effect

rhetoric

The art of analyzing all the choices involving language that a writer, speaker,reader, or listener might make in a situation so that the text becomes meaningful,purposeful, and effective; the specific features of texts, written or spoken, that cause them to be meaningful, purposeful, and effective for readers or listeners in a situation.

rhetorical choices

The particular choices a writer or speaker makes to achieve meaning,purpose, or effect

rhetorical question

A question posed by the speaker or writer not to seek an answer but instead to affirm or deny a point simply by asking a question about it.

rhetorical situation

The convergence in a situation of exigency (the need to write),audience, and purpose.

sarcasm

The use of mockery or bitter irony

simile

A type of comparison that uses the word like or as.

simple sentence

A sentence with one independent clause and no dependent clause

stance

A writer's or speaker's apparent attitude toward the audience.

style

The choices that writers or speakers make in language for effect

subordinate clause

A group of words that includes a subject and verb but that cannot stand on its own as a sentence; also called dependent clause.

synecdoche

A part of something used to refer to the whole-for example, "50 head of cattle" referring to 50 complete animals.

syntax

The order of words in a sentence

tone

The writer's or speaker's attitude toward the subject matter.

understatement

Deliberate playing down of a situation in order to make a point "As the principal dancer, Joe displayed only two flaws: his arms and his legs."

verisimilitude

The quality of a text that reflects the truth of actual experience

voice

The textual features, such as diction and sentence structure, that convey a writer's or a speaker's persona

zeugma

A trope in which one word, usually a noun or the main verb, governs two otherwords not related in meaning ("He maintained a business and his innocence ")