Figure of speech
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A figure of speech, sometimes termed a rhetorical figure or device, or elocution, is a word or phrase that departs from straightforward, literal language. Figures of speech are often used and crafted for emphasis, freshness of expression, or clarity. However, clarity may also suffer from their use.
Note that not all theories of meaning necessarily have a concept of "literal language" (see literal and figurative language). Under theories that do not, figure of speech is not an entirely coherent concept.
As an example of the figurative use of a word, consider the sentence, I am going to crown you. It may mean:
- I am going to place a literal crown on your head.
- I am going to symbolically exalt you to the place of kingship.
- I am going to punch you in the head with my clenched fist.
- I am going to put a second checker on top of your checker to signify that it has become a king (as in the game of draughts).
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Classification
Figures of speech have been classified into a number of different categories. Most figures originated out of centuries of philological commentary on ancient texts, and so most are named from Greek or Latin, as they originally were meant to classify grammatical peculiarities of those languages.
Scholars of classical Western rhetoric have divided figures of speech into two main categories: schemes and tropes. Schemes (from the Greek schēma, form or shape) are figures of speech in which there is a deviation from the ordinary or expected pattern of words. For example, the phrase, "John, my best friend" uses the scheme known as apposition. Tropes (from the Greek tropein, to turn) involve changing or modifying the general meaning of a term. An example of a trope is the use of irony, which is the use of word in a way that conveys a meaning opposite to its usual meaning ("For Brutus is an honorable man; / So, are they all, honorable men").
During the Renaissance, a time when scholars in every discipline had a passion for classifying all things, writers expended a great deal of energy in devising all manner of classes and sub-classes of figures of speech. Henry Peacham, for example, in his The Garden of Eloquence (1577) enumerated 184 different figures of speech.
For the sake of simplicity, this article divides the figures between schemes and tropes, but does not attempt further sub-classification (e.g., "Figures of Disorder"). Within each category, words are listed alphabetically. Each figure links to a page that provides greater detail and relevant examples, but a short definition is placed here for convenience. Some of those listed may be considered rhetorical devices, which are similar in many ways.
Schemes
- accumulatio: Summarization of previous arguments in a forceful manner
- alliteration: Repetition of consonants in nearby words
- anacoluthon: A change in the syntax within a sentence
- anadiplosis: Repetition of a word at the end of a clause at the beginning of another
- anaphora: The repetition of the same word or group of words at the beginning of successive clauses
- anastrophe: Inversion of the usual word order
- antimetabole: Repetition of words in successive clauses, in reverse order
- antistrophe: The repetition of the same word or phrase at the end of successive clauses
- antithesis: The juxtaposition of opposing or contrasting ideas
- aposiopesis: Breaking off or pausing speech for dramatic or emotional effect
- apostrophe: Directing the attention away from the audience and to a personified abstraction, either present or not
- apposition: The placing of two elements side by side, in which the second defines the first
- assonance: The repetition of vowel sounds, most commonly within a short passage of verse.
- asyndeton: Omission of conjunctions between related clauses
- cacophony: The juxtaposition of words producing a harsh sound
- chiasmus: Reversal of grammatical structures in successive clauses
- climax: The arrangement of words in order of increasing importance
- dystmesis: A synonym for tmesis
- ellipsis: Omission of words
- enallage: The substitution of forms that are grammatically different, but have the same meaning
- enthymeme: Informal method of presenting a syllogism
- epanalepsis: Repetition of a word at the beginning and end of a clause
- epistrophe: The counterpart of anaphora
- hendiadys: Use of two nouns to express an idea when the normal structure would be a noun and a modifier
- hendiatris: Use of three nouns to express one idea
- hypallage: Changing the order of words so that they are associated with words normally associated with others
- hyperbaton: Schemes featuring unusual or inverted word order
- isocolon: Use of parallel structures of the same length in successive clauses
- parallelism: The use of similar structures in two or more clauses
- paraprosdokian: Unexpected ending or truncation of a clause
- parenthesis: Insertion of a clause or sentence in a place where it interrupts the natural flow of the sentence
- perissologia: The fault of wordiness
- pleonasm: The use of superfluous or redundant words
- polyptoton: Repetition of words derived from the same root
- polysyndeton: Repetition of conjunctions
- synchysis: Interlocked word order
- synesis: An agreement of words according to the sense, and not the grammatical form
- synonymia: The use of two or more synonyms in the same clause or sentence
- tautology: Redundancy due to superfluous qualification; saying the same thing twice
- tmesis: Division of the elements of a compound word
Tropes
- allegory: An extended metaphor in which a story is told to illustrate an important attribute of the subject
- anacoenosis: Posing a question to an audience, often with the implication that it shares a common interest with the speaker
- antanaclasis: A form of pun in which a word is repeated in two different senses
- anthimeria: The substitution of one part of speech for another, often turning a noun into a verb
- anthropomorphism: applying human or animal qualities to inanimate objects
- antiphrasis: A word or words used contradictory to their usual meaning, often with irony
- antonomasia: The substitution of a phrase for a proper name or vice versa
- aphorism: Calling into question the meaning of a term
- apophasis: Invoking an idea by denying its invocation
- aporia: Deliberating with oneself, often with the use of rhetorical questions
- apostrophe: Addressing a thing, an abstraction or a person not present
- archaism: Use of an obsolete, archaic, word
- auxesis: A form of hyperbole, in which a more important sounding word is used in place of a more descriptive term
- catachresis: A mixed metaphor (sometimes used by design and sometimes a rhetorical fault)
- circumlocution: "Talking around" a topic by substituting or adding words, as in euphemism or periphrasis
- denominatio: Another word for metonymy
- erotema: Synonym for rhetorical question
- euphemism: Substitution of a less offensive or more agreeable term for another
- hyperbole: Use of exaggerated terms for emphasis
- hypophora: Answering one's own rhetorical question at length
- hysteron proteron: Reversal of anticipated order of events
- innuendo: Having a hidden meaning in a sentence that makes sense whether it is detected or not
- irony: Use of word in a way that conveys a meaning opposite to its usual meaning
- litotes: Emphasizing the magnitude of a statement by denying its opposite
- malapropism: Using a word through confusion with a word that sounds similar
- meiosis: Use of understatement, usually to diminish the importance of something
- metalepsis: Referring to something through reference to another thing to which it is remotely related
- metaphor: An implied comparison of two things
- metonymy: Substitution of a word to suggest what is really meant
- oxymoron: Using two terms together, that normally contradict each other
- parable: An extended metaphor told as an anecdote to illustrate or teach a moral lesson
- paradox: Use of apparently contradictory ideas to point out some underlying truth
- paralipsis: Drawing attention to something while pretending to pass it over
- paronomasia: A form of pun, in which words similar in sound but with different meanings are used
- pathetic fallacy: Using a word that refers to a human action on something non-human
- periphrasis: Substitution of a word or phrase for a proper name
- personification/prosopopoeia/anthropomorphism: Attributing a personality to some impersonal object
- praeteritio: Another word for paralipsis
- procatalepsis: Refuting anticipated objections as part of the main argument
- prolepsis: Another word for procatalepsis
- proslepsis: An extreme form of paralipsis in which the speaker provides great detail while feigning to pass over a topic
- rhetorical question: Asking a question as a way of asserting something
- simile: An explicit comparison between two things
- syllepsis: A form of pun, in which a single word is used to modify two other words, with which it normally would have differing meanings
- synecdoche: A form of metonymy, in which a part stands for the whole
- transferred epithet: The placing of an adjective with what appears to be the incorrect noun
- truism: a self-evident statement
- zeugma: a figure of speech related to syllepsis, but different in that the word used as a modifier is not compatible with one of the two words it modifies
- zoomorphism: applying animal characteristics to humans or gods
See also
References
- Aristotle. The Art of Rhetoric. (Translated by J. H. Freese) Loeb Classical Library.
- Baldwin, Charles Sears. Ancient Rhetoric and Poetic: Interpreted from Representative Works. Peter Smith, Gloucester, 1959 (reprint).
- Rhetorica ad Herennium. (Translated by Henry Caplan) Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1954.
- Corbett, Edward P.J. Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student Oxford University Press, New York, 1971.
- Kennedy, George. Art of Persuasion in Greece. Princeton Univ Press, 1969 (4th printing).
- Mackin, John H. Classical Rhetoric for Modern Discourse. Free Press, New York, 1969.
- Quintilian. Institutio oratoria. (In five volumes, trans. Donald A. Russell) Loeb Classical Library, 2002.
