Terms : Hide Images
| 13710260843 | Active Voice | The subject of the sentence performs the action. This is a more direct and preferred style of writing in most cases | 0 | |
| 13710260844 | Passive Voice | often overused, resulting in lifeless writing | 1 | |
| 13710260845 | Allusion | An indirect reference to something (usually a literary text, although it can be other things commonly known, such as plays, songs, historical events) with which the reader is supposed to be familiar | 2 | |
| 13710260846 | Alter-ego | A character that is used by the author to speak the author's own thoughts; when an author speaks directly to the audience through a character | 3 | |
| 13710260847 | Persona | the mask of an actor, which refers to the list of characters and cast in a play or a drama | 4 | |
| 13710260848 | Anecdote | A brief recounting of a relevant episode. Anecdotes are often inserted into fictional or non fictional texts as a way of developing a point or injecting humor | 5 | |
| 13710260849 | Antecedent | The word, phrase, or clause referred to by a pronoun | 6 | |
| 13710260850 | Classicism | Art or literature characterized by a realistic view of people and the world; sticks to traditional themes and structures (see romanticism) | 7 | |
| 13710260851 | Comic relief | when a humorous scene is inserted into a serious story, in order to lighten the mood somewhat | 8 | |
| 13710260852 | Diction | Word choice, particularly as an element of style. Different types of words have significant effects on meaning | 9 | |
| 13710260853 | Colloquial | Ordinary or familiar type of conversation | 10 | |
| 13710260854 | Connotation | Rather than the dictionary definition (denotation), the associations suggested by a word. Implied meaning rather than literal meaning | 11 | |
| 13710260855 | Denotation | The literal, explicit meaning of a word, without its connotations | 12 | |
| 13710260856 | Jargon | The diction used by a group which practices a similar profession or activity | 13 | |
| 13710260857 | Vernacular | 1. Language or dialect of a particular country 2. Language or dialect of a regional clan or group 3. Plain everyday speech | 14 | |
| 13710260858 | Didactic | A term used to describe fiction, nonfiction or poetry that teaches a specific lesson or moral or provides a model of correct behavior or thinking | 15 | |
| 13710260859 | Aphorism | A terse statement which expresses a general truth or moral principle. An aphorism can be a memorable summation of the author's point | 16 | |
| 13710260860 | Adage | A folk saying with a lesson | 17 | |
| 13710260861 | Allegory | A story, fictional or non fictional, in which characters, things, and events represent qualities or concepts. The interaction of these characters, things, and events is meant to reveal an abstraction or a truth | 18 | |
| 13710260862 | Ellipsis | The deliberate omission of a word or phrase from prose done for effect by the author | 19 | |
| 13710260863 | Euphemism | A more agreeable or less offensive substitute for generally unpleasant words or concepts. Sometimes they are used for political correctness | 20 | |
| 13710260864 | Figurative Language | A more agreeable or less offensive substitute for generally unpleasant words or concepts. Sometimes they are used for political correctness | 21 | |
| 13710260865 | Literal language | writing that makes complete sense when you take it at face value | 22 | |
| 13710260866 | Analogy | An analogy is a comparison of one pair of variables to a parallel set of variables. When a writer uses an analogy, he or she argues that the relationship between the first pair of variables is the same as the relationship between the second pair of variables | 23 | |
| 13710260867 | Hyperbole | Exagerration | 24 | |
| 13710260868 | Idiom | A common, often used expression that doesn't make sense if you take it literally | 25 | |
| 13710260869 | Metaphor | Making an implied comparison (not using "like," as," or other such words) | 26 | |
| 13710260870 | Extended metaphor | when the metaphor is continued later in the written work | 27 | |
| 13710260871 | Conceit | A particularly elaborate extended metaphor | 28 | |
| 13710260872 | Metonymy | Replacing an actual word or idea, with a related word or concept | 29 | |
| 13710260873 | Synecdoche | A kind of metonymy when a whole is represented by naming one of its parts, or vice versa | 30 | |
| 13710260874 | Simile | Using words such as "like" or "as" to make a direct comparison between two very different things | 31 | |
| 13710260875 | Synesthesia | a description involving a "crossing of the senses | 32 | |
| 13710260876 | Personification | Giving human-like qualities to something that is not human | 33 | |
| 13710260877 | Foreshadowing | When an author gives hints about what will occur later in a story | 34 | |
| 13710260878 | Genre | The major category into which a literary work fits. The basic divisions of literature are prose, poetry, and drama | 35 | |
| 13710260879 | Gothic | Writing characterized by gloom, mystery, fear and/or death. Also refers to an architectural style of the middle ages, often seen in cathedrals of this period | 36 | |
| 13710260880 | Imagery | Word or words that create a picture in the reader's mind. Usually this involves the five senses. Authors often use imagery in conjunction with metaphors, similes, or figures of speech. | 37 | |
| 13710260881 | Invective | A long, emotionally violent, attack using strong, abusive language | 38 | |
| 13710260882 | Irony | When the opposite of what you expect to happen does | 39 | |
| 13710260883 | Verbal irony | When you say something and mean the opposite/something different. | 40 | |
| 13710260884 | Dramatic irony | When the audience of a drama, play, movie, etc. knows something that the character doesn't and would be surprised to find out | 41 | |
| 13710260885 | Situational irony | Found in the plot (or story line) of a book, story, or movie | 42 | |
| 13710260886 | Juxtaposition | Placing things side by side for the purposes of comparison | 43 | |
| 13710260887 | Mood | The atmosphere created by the literature and accomplished through word choice | 44 | |
| 13710260888 | Motif | a recurring idea in a piece of literature | 45 | |
| 13710260889 | Oxymoron | When apparently contradictory terms are grouped together and suggest a paradox | 46 | |
| 13710260890 | Pacing | The speed or tempo of an author's writing | 47 | |
| 13710260891 | Paradox | A seemingly contradictory situation which is actually true | 48 | |
| 13710260892 | Parallelism | Sentence construction which places equal grammatical constructions near each other, or repeats identical grammatical patterns | 49 | |
| 13710260893 | Anaphora | Repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences or clauses in a row | 50 | |
| 13710260894 | Chiasmus | When the same words are used twice in succession, but the second time, the order of the words is reversed | 51 | |
| 13710260895 | Antithesis | Two opposite or contrasting words, phrases, or clauses, or even ideas, with parallel structure | 52 | |
| 13710260896 | Zuegma (Syllepsis) | When a single word governs or modifies two or more other words, and the meaning of the first word must change for each of the other words it governs or modifies | 53 | |
| 13710260897 | Parenthetical Idea | Parentheses are used to set off an idea from the rest of the sentence | 54 | |
| 13710260898 | Parody | An exaggerated imitation of a serious work for humorous purposes. It borrows words or phrases from an original, and pokes fun at it | 55 | |
| 13710260899 | Poetic device | A device used in poetry to manipulate the sound of words, sentences or lines | 56 | |
| 13710260900 | Alliteration | The repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of words | 57 | |
| 13710260901 | Assonance | The repetition of identical or similar vowel sounds. | 58 | |
| 13710260902 | Consonance | The repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of words | 59 | |
| 13710260903 | Onomatopoeia | The use of a word which imitates or suggests the sound that the thing makes | 60 | |
| 13710260904 | Internal rhyme | When a line of poetry contains a rhyme within a single line | 61 | |
| 13710260905 | Slant rhyme | When a poet creates a rhyme, but the two words do not rhyme exactly - they are merely similar | 62 | |
| 13710260906 | End rhyme | When the last word of two different lines of poetry rhymn | 63 | |
| 13710260907 | Rhyme Scheme | The pattern of a poem's end rhymes | 64 | |
| 13710260908 | Meter | A regular pattern to the syllables in lines of poetry | 65 | |
| 13710260909 | Free verse | Poetry that doesn't have much meter or rhyme | 66 | |
| 13710260910 | Iambic pentameter | Poetry that is written in lines of 10 syllables, alternating stressed and unstressed syllables. | 67 | |
| 13710260911 | Sonnet | A 14 line poem written in iambic pentameter. Usually divided into three quatrains and a couplet | 68 | |
| 13710260912 | Polysyndeton | When a writer creates a list of items which are all separated by conjunctions. Normally, a conjunction is used only before the last item in a list | 69 | |
| 13710260913 | Pun | When a word that has two or more meanings is used in a humorous way | 70 | |
| 13710260914 | Rhetoric | The art of effective communication, especially the use of figures of speech and other compositional techniques. | 71 | |
| 13710260915 | Rhetorical Question | Question not asked for information but for effect. | 72 | |
| 13710260967 | Romanticism | 73 | ||
| 13710260916 | Sarcasm | A generally bitter comment that is ironically or satirically worded | 74 | |
| 13710260917 | Satire | A work that reveals a critical attitude toward some element of life to a humorous effect | 75 | |
| 13710260918 | Sentence | A sentence is group of words (including subject and verb) that expresses a complete thought | 76 | |
| 13710260919 | Appositive | A word or group of words placed beside a noun or noun substitute to supplement its meaning | 77 | |
| 13710260920 | Clause | A grammatical unit that contains both a subject and a verb | 78 | |
| 13710260921 | Independent clause | expresses a complete thought and can stand alone as a sentence | 79 | |
| 13710260922 | Dependent (subordinate) clause | cannot stand alone as a sentence and must be accompanied by an independent clause | 80 | |
| 13710260923 | Balanced sentence | A sentence in which two parallel elements are set off against each other like equal weights on a scale | 81 | |
| 13710260924 | Compound sentence | Contains at least two independent clauses but no dependent clauses | 82 | |
| 13710260925 | Complex sentence | Contains only one independent clause and at least one dependent clause | 83 | |
| 13710260926 | Cumulative sentence (loose sentence) | When the writer begins with an independent clause, then adds subordinate elements | 84 | |
| 13710260927 | Periodic sentence | When the main idea is not completed until the end of the sentence | 85 | |
| 13710260928 | Simple sentence | Contains only one independent clause. | 86 | |
| 13710260929 | Declarative sentence | States an idea. It does not give a command or request, nor does it ask a question. | 87 | |
| 13710260930 | Imperative sentence | Issues a command | 88 | |
| 13710260931 | Interrogative sentence | Sentences incorporating interrogative pronouns (what, which, who, whom, and whose) | 89 | |
| 13710260932 | Style | The choices in diction, tone, and syntax that a writer makes. Style may be conscious or unconscious | 90 | |
| 13710260933 | Symbol | Anything that represents or stands for something else | 91 | |
| 13710260934 | Syntax/sentence variety | Grammatical arrangement of words | 92 | |
| 13710260935 | Theme | The central idea or message of a work | 93 | |
| 13710260936 | Thesis | The sentence or groups of sentences that directly expresses the author's opinion, purpose, meaning, or proposition | 94 | |
| 13710260937 | Tone | A writer's attitude toward his subject matter revealed through diction, figurative language and organization | 95 | |
| 13710260938 | Understatement | The ironic minimizing of fact, understatement presents something as less significant than it is | 96 | |
| 13710260939 | Litotes | a particular form of understatement, generated by denying the opposite of the statement which otherwise would be used | 97 | |
| 13710260940 | Argument | a piece of reasoning with one or more premises and a conclusion | 98 | |
| 13710260941 | Premises | Statements offered as reasons to support a conclusion are premises | 99 | |
| 13710260942 | Conclusion | the end result of the argument | 100 | |
| 13710260943 | Aristotle's appeals | The goal of argumentative writing is to persuade an audience that one's ideas are valid, or more valid than someone else's. | 101 | |
| 13710260944 | Ethos | means being convinced by the credibility of the author | 102 | |
| 13710260945 | Pathos | means persuading by appealing to the reader's emotion | 103 | |
| 13710260946 | Logos | means persuading by the use of reasoning, using true premises and valid arguments | 104 | |
| 13710260947 | Concession | Accepting at least part or all of an opposing viewpoint | 105 | |
| 13710260948 | Conditional Statement | an if-then statement and consists of two parts, an antecedent and a consequent | 106 | |
| 13710260949 | Contradiction | A contradiction occurs when one asserts two mutually exclusive propositions | 107 | |
| 13710260950 | Counterexample | an example that runs counter to (opposes) a generalization, thus falsifying it | 108 | |
| 13710260951 | Deductive argument | An argument in which it is thought that the premises provide a guarantee of the truth of the conclusion | 109 | |
| 13710260952 | Fallacy | A fallacy is an attractive but unreliable piece of reasoning | 110 | |
| 13710260953 | Ad hominem | Latin for "against the man". Personally attacking your opponents instead of their arguments | 111 | |
| 13710260954 | Appeal to authority | The claim that because somebody famous supports an idea, the idea must be right | 112 | |
| 13710260955 | Appeal to the bandwagon | The claim, as evidence for an idea, that many people believe it, or used to believe it, or do it | 113 | |
| 13710260956 | Appeal to emotion | An attempt to replace a logical argument with an appeal to the audience's emotions | 114 | |
| 13710260957 | Bad analogy | Claiming that two situations are highly similar, when they aren't. | 115 | |
| 13710260958 | Cliche thinking | Using as evidence a well-known saying, as if it is proven, or as if it has no exceptions | 116 | |
| 13710260959 | False cause | Assuming that because two things happened, the first one caused the second one | 117 | |
| 13710260960 | Hasty generalization | A generalization based on too little or unrepresentative data | 118 | |
| 13710260961 | Non Sequitur | A conclusion that does not follow from its premises; an invalid argument. | 119 | |
| 13710260962 | Slippery slope | The assumption that once started, a situation will continue to its most extreme possible outcome | 120 | |
| 13710260963 | Inductive argument | An argument in which it is thought that the premises provide reasons supporting the probable truth of the conclusion | 121 | |
| 13710260964 | Sound argument | A deductive argument is said to be sound if it meets two conditions: First, that the line of reasoning from the premises to the conclusion is valid. Second, that the premises are true | 122 | |
| 13710260965 | Unstated premises | Not every argument is fully expressed. Sometimes premises or even conclusions are left unexpressed | 123 | |
| 13710260966 | Valid argument | An argument is valid if the conclusion logically follows from the premises | 124 | |
| 13710276795 | Archetype | A detail, image, or character type that occurs frequently in literature and myth and is thought to appeal in a universal way to the unconscious and to evoke a response | 125 | |
| 13710280479 | Asyndeton | A construction in which elements are presented in a series without conjunctions | 126 | |
| 13710287112 | epigram | a brief, pithy, and often paradoxical saying | 127 | |
| 13710300120 | Epigraph | a saying or statement on the title page of a work, or used as a heading for a chapter or other section of a work | 128 | |
| 13710302949 | Epithet | a term used to point out a characteristic of a person. Homeric epithets are often compound adjectives ("swift-footed Achilles") that become an almost formulaic part of a name. Epithets can be abusive or offensive but are not so by definition. For example, athletes may be proud of their given epithets ("The Rocket") | 129 | |
| 13710309903 | eulogy | (n.) a formal statement of commendation; high praise | 130 | |
| 13710315409 | homily | a sermon | 131 | |
| 13710315410 | Hubris | excessive pride | 132 | |
| 13710323255 | malapropism | the mistaken substitution of a word | 133 | |
| 13710331620 | non sequitur | an inference that does not follow logically from the premises | 134 | |
| 13710339498 | philippic | a strong verbal denunciation | 135 | |
| 13710346902 | tautology | needless repetition | 136 |
