Midterm vocab (IHUM)

Midterm Vocabulary

Groundlings - audience members who are of low-class society who stand in the pit of the theater

breaking the 4th wall - breaking through an imaginary invisible wall that separates actors from the audience.

Primogeniture - a tradition of passing the property of a dead person to their firstborn legitimate child.

the Renaissance - the revival of art, literature, science, culture etc. in the 14th-16th centuries

Humanism - a philosophy about the thoughts and importance of man(humans/mortals) rather than the divine

magical realism - a type of genre that presents the realistic world with elements of magic mixed in

Postmodernism (as a cultural/artistic movement) - An era during 1970-1990, where a new style of self-awareness and rejection of modern ideas for theatrical and theoretical ideas dominated cultures and art.

Metafiction - A type of fiction that reminds the audience that they are reading a fictional work.

Assonance - The repetition of vowel sounds in words that are close together in a sentence or verse

Alliteration - the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words in a line or phrase

Simile - a figure of speech comparing two things that are not alike using the words "like" or "as"

Metaphor - used to establish imagery and create a vivid picture of a person, object, or action

Personification - used in poetry to give human characteristics to nonhuman things, such as animals, objects, or abstract ideas

Point of view - a particular way of thinking about something

Setting - the surroundings of where an event takes place

Symbolism - the use of symbols(things that represent other things) when explaining ideas or concepts.

Allegory - a story or narrative with a hidden meaning or moral theme

frame story - a literary device where a main narrative sets the stage for a secondary story or stories

scientific naturalism - a worldview that combines the ideas that nature is all that exists and that the scientific method is the only reliable way to learn about nature

unreliable narrator - an unreliable narrator is a narrator who cannot be trusted, one whose credibility is compromised

Vertical Line - a straight line that runs up and down

Horizontal Line - a straight line that runs left to right

Diagonal Line - a straight line that slopes from one bottom corner to a top corner

Hatching - an artistic technique that involves drawing closely-spaced parallel lines to create shading or tonal effects

Actual Line - physical marks made in a composition

Implied Line - lines that are suggested

Closure - describes how people tend to perceive incomplete images as complete objects

Continuity - a principle of visual perception that describes how the human eye tends to see lines and curves as flowing and connected

Geometric shapes - precise shapes with straight angles and lines

Organic shapes - irregular shapes that are similar to shapes found in nature

Amorphous shapes - shapes lacking structure/non-geometric

Positive and negative shapes - positive shapes are the objects, while negative shapes are the areas in between objects

Value contrast - the difference between light and dark in a piece of art

Value pattern - the placement of objects in artwork that guides the eye and creates unity between the objects

Low key / high key values - used to describe a painting that's related to the low-key or high-key lighting of cinema or photography

Chiaroscuro - a technique that uses light and shadow to make 3D objects

Warm colors - colors that give off the feeling of warmth, energy, and heat.

Cool colors - colors that give off the feeling of relaxed, calm, and cooling emotions

Monochromatic schemes - theme with hues of the same color instead of different colors

Analogous color schemes - groups of colors that appear next to each other on the color wheel

Complementary scheme - uses colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel to create a high-contrast, vibrant look

Discordant colors - deliberate to specifically bring out a person, place, or thing

Arbitrary color - a choice of color in an artwork that has no basis in the realistic appearance of the object depicted

"Denatured" color - method of painting that uses denatured alcohol to create un-naturalistic and marble-like shapes

Relative size - clues in the picture that help you figure out the size of objects

Overlapping - a technique that involves placing one object in front of another to create the illusion of depth and three-dimensionality

Transparency - the quality of being able to see through (or partially see through) one or more layers in an artwork

Vertical Positioning - the use of lines and shapes that run up and down, and the effect that has on the viewer

Atmospheric depth - the illusion of depth moving back into space

Linear Perspective - a system of creating an illusion of depth on a flat surface

Vantage Point - a stationary point from which a viewer is related to the object/figure being rendered

Vanishing Point - the point where parallel lines that recede into the distance appear to meet on the horizon line

Arch - a curved symmetrical structure usually used to support the weight of a different structure

Atrium - a central hall or court in a modern building, often glass-covered

Buttress - a projecting support of stone or brick built against a wall

Cantilever - a long projecting beam or girder fixed at only one end

Column/pillar - a tall vertical structure of stone, wood, or metal used to support a building

Dome - a rounded vault forming the roof of a building or structure

Façade - the face of a building, especially the main front that looks onto a street or open space