Terms needed for success on the AP Language and Composition Exam
Terms : Hide Images
| 5956289556 | Personification | The assigning of human qualities to inanimate objects or concepts. An example: Wordsworth's "the sea that bares her bosom to the moon." | 0 | |
| 5956289557 | Ambiguity | The uncertainty or indefinite to a subject with more than one interpertation | 1 | |
| 5956289558 | Oxymoron | From the Greek for "pointedly foolish," ___ is a figure of speech wherein the author groups apparently contradictory terms. Simple examples include "jumbo shrimp" and "cruel kindness." | 2 | |
| 5956289559 | Sarcasm | from the Greek meaning "to tear flesh," ___ involves bitter, caustic language that is meant to hurt or ridicule someone or something. It may use irony as a device. | 3 | |
| 5956289560 | Bathos | a forces emotion that is normally faults and humorous | 4 | |
| 5956289561 | Hyperbole | a figure of speech using deliberate exaggeration or overstatement | 5 | |
| 5956289562 | Logical Fallacies | an error in reasoning that renders an argument invalid | 6 | |
| 5956289563 | Either/Thinking | to see an issue as having only two sides. | 7 | |
| 5956289564 | Non sequitur | a conclusion that does not follow from established premises or evidence | 8 | |
| 5956289565 | Paradox | A statement that appears to be self-contradictory or opposed to common sense but upon closer inspection contains some degree of truth or validity. | 9 | |
| 5956289566 | Onomatopoeia | a figure of speech in which natural sounds are imitated in the sounds of words. Simple examples include such words as buzz, hiss, hum. | 10 | |
| 5956289567 | Post hoc. ergo propter | An inference or conclusion that does not follow from established premised or evidence | 11 | |
| 5956289568 | Metaphor | a direct comparison between dissimilar things. "Your eyes are stars" is an example. | 12 | |
| 5956289569 | Symbol | generally, anything that represents, stands for, something else. Usually, a ___ is something concrete—such as an object, action, character, or scene—that represents something more abstract. | 13 | |
| 5956289570 | Begging the question | Assuming in a premise that which needs to be proven. | 14 | |
| 5956289571 | Understatement | the opposite of exaggeration. It is a technique for developing irony and/or humor where one writes or says less than intended. | 15 | |
| 5956289572 | False analogy | Assuming ina premises that needs to be proven | 16 | |
| 5956289574 | Imagery | The sensory details or figurative language used to describe, arouse emotion, or represent abstractions. On a physical level, __ uses terms related to the five senses; we refer to visual, auditory, tactile, gustatory, or olfactory. For example, a rose may present visual __ while also representing the color in a woman's cheeks. | 17 | |
| 5956289576 | Figure of Speech | A device used to produce figurative language. Many compare dissimilar things. Examples are apostrophe, hyperbole, irony, metaphor, metonomy, oxymoron, paradox, personification, simile, synecdoche, and understatement. | 18 | |
| 5956289577 | Irony | The contrast between what is stated explicitly and what is really meant. The difference between what appears to be and what actually is true. | 19 | |
| 5956289578 | Satire | A work that targets human vices and follies or social institutions and convention for reform or ridicule. Regardless of whether or not the work aims to reform humans or their society, ___ is best seen as a style of writing rather than a purpose for writing. The effect of __, often humorous, is thought provoking and insightful about the human condition. | 20 | |
| 5956289579 | Alliteration | The repetition of initial consonant sounds, such as "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers." | 21 | |
| 5956289582 | Narrative | The telling of a story or an account of an event or series of events. | 22 | |
| 5956289583 | Ethos | an appeal based on the character of the speaker. An __-driven document relies on the reputation of the author. | 23 | |
| 5956289584 | Situational Irony | a type of irony in which events turn out the opposite of what was expected. | 24 | |
| 5956289586 | Pathos | an appeal based on emotion. | 25 | |
| 5956289587 | Logos | an appeal based on logic or reason | 26 | |
| 5956289589 | Anecdote | A story or brief episode told by the writer or a character to illustrate a point. | 27 | |
| 5956289590 | Abstract Language | Language describing ideas and qualities rather than observable or specific things, people, or places. | 28 | |
| 5956289591 | Denotation | the literal or dictionary meaning of a word | 29 | |
| 5956289594 | Parody | A work that closely imitates the style or content of another with the specific aim of comic effect and/or ridicule. | 30 | |
| 5956289595 | Connotation | the interpretive level or a word based on its associated images rather than its literal meaning. | 31 | |
| 5956289596 | Repetition | The duplication, either exact or approximate, or any element of language, such as sound, word, phrase, clause, sentence, or grammatical pattern. | 32 | |
| 5956289597 | Syntax | The grammatical structure of prose and poetry. | 33 | |
| 5956289599 | Argument | A single assertion or a series of assertions presented and defended by the writer | 34 | |
| 5956289600 | Allusion | A reference contained in a work | 35 | |
| 5956289601 | Parallelism | refers to the grammatical or rhetorical framing of words, phrases, sentences, or paragraphs to give structural similarity. | 36 | |
| 5956289602 | Analogy | a literary device employed to serve as a basis for comparison. It is assumed that what applies to the parallel situation also applies to the original circumstance. In other words, it is the comparison between two different items. | 37 | |
| 5956289603 | Figurative Language | Writing or speech that is not intended to carry literal meaning and is usually meant to be imaginative and vivid. | 38 | |
| 5956289604 | Description | The purpose of this rhetorical mode is to re-create, invent, or visually present a person, place, event, or action so that the reader can picture that being described. Sometimes an author engages all five senses. | 39 | |
| 5956289608 | Argumentation | The purpose of this rhetorical mode is to prove the validity of an idea, or point of view, by presenting sound reasoning, discussion, and argument that thoroughly convince the reader. | 40 | |
| 5956289610 | Narration | The purpose of this type of rhetorical mode is to tell the story or narrate an event or series of events. | 41 | |
| 5956289611 | Colloquial | the use of slang in writing, often to create local color and to provide an informal tone. Huckleberry Finn in written in a __ style. | 42 | |
| 5956289612 | Antecedent | the word, phrase, or clause to which a pronoun refers. | 43 | |
| 5956289613 | Style | an evaluation of the sum of the choices an author makes in blending diction, syntax, figurative language, and other literary devices. | 44 | |
| 5956289614 | Thesis | The sentence or group of sentences that directly expresses the author's opinion, purpose, meaning, or proposition. | 45 | |
| 5956289618 | Dialect | the recreation of regional spoken language, such as a Southern one. Hurston uses this in Their Eyes Were Watching God. | 46 | |
| 5956289619 | Asyndeton | Commas used (with no conjunction) to separate a series of words. The parts are emphasized equally when the conjunction is omitted; in addition, the use of commas with no intervening conjunction speeds up the flow of the sentence. X, Y, Z as opposed to X, Y, and Z. | 47 | |
| 5956289620 | Wit | In modern usage, intellectually amusing language that surprises and delights. Usually uses terse language that makes a pointed statement. | 48 | |
| 5956289621 | Mood | This term has two distinct technical meanings in English writing. The first meaning is grammatical and deals with verbal units and a speaker's attitude. The second meaning is literary, meaning the prevailing atmosphere or emotional aura of a work. | 49 | |
| 5956289622 | Diction | the author's choice of words that creates tone, attitude, and style, as well as meaning | 50 | |
| 5956289624 | Tone | A writer's attitude toward his or her subject matter revealed through diction, figurative language, and organization on the sentence and global levels. | 51 | |
| 5956289625 | Juxtaposition | Placement of two things closely together to emphasize comparisons or contrasts | 52 |
