Figurative language: tropes

Difference schemes and tropes

  • Schemes = Satzfiguren, affect syntactic structure

  • Tropes = Wortfigure, meaning of word is affected

Figures of similarity:

  • Metaphor:

    • implicit comparison

    • characteristics of vehicle are transferred to tenor without use of comparative articles

    • overlaps in salient features

    • Source/Target domain

    • → Makes use of vehicle to describe tenor

  • Simile: one thing connected to other by means of comparative article (like)

  • Personification: idea, thing or non-human entity is presented as if it were human

  • Synesthesia: vehicle and tenor allude to different sensory perceptions

Figures of contiguity (overlapping)

  • Synecdoche: replacement of part with a whole or vice versa

  • Metonymy: replacement of one term with another to which it is logically or causaly connected

Further tropes

  • Symbol: item stands for a concept (vehicle is there as concrete object)

  • Euphemism: more positive term is used to make something seem better than it is

  • Hyperbole: Exaggeration

  • Irony: use of expression that means opposite of what is said

  • Litotes: referende to element by negating its opposite