AP Language and Composition Terminology Flashcards

6985155807	Alliteration	The repetition of the same sound or letter at the beginning of consecutive words or syllables. E.g.: Fred's friends fried Fritos for Friday's food.	0
6985156938	Allusion	An indirect reference, often to another text or an historic event. E.g.: "She acted like a scrooge" (Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol).	1
6985159867	Analogy	An extended comparison between two seemingly dissimilar things. E.g.: "Life is like a box of chocolates - you never know what you're gonna get!"	2
6985161234	Anaphora	The repetition of words at the beginning of successive clauses. E.g.: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness..."	3
6985162396	Anecdote	A short account of an interesting event. E.g.: A grandfather tells his grandchildren a story of his childhood.	4
6985163577	Annotation	Explanatory or critical notes added to a text.* *Definition of annotation.	5
6985164344	Antecedent	The noun to which a later pronoun refers. E.g.: When children are happy, they clap to express their pleasure.	6
6985165326	Antimetabole	The repetition of words in an inverted order to sharpen a contrast. E.g.: "Eat to live, not live to eat" // "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail"	7
6985166897	Antithesis	Parallel structure that juxtaposes contrasting ideas. E.g.: Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice.	8
6985167356	Aphorism	A short, astute statement of a general truth. E.g.: The simplest questions are the hardest to answer.	9
6985167729	Appositive	A word or phrase that renames a nearby noun or pronoun. E.g.: The insect, a cockroach, is crawling across the kitchen table.	10
6985168512	Archaic diction	The use of words common to an earlier time period; antiquated language. E.g.: Shakespeare: hath, thy, thou.	11
6985168513	Argument	A statement put forth and supported by evidence.	12
6985169057	Aristotelian triangle	A diagram that represents a rhetorical situation as the relationship among the speaker, the subject, and the audience (see rhetorical triangle).	13
6985169769	Assertion	An emphatic statement; declaration. An assertion supported by evidence becomes an argument.	14
6985170504	Assumption	A belief or statement taken for granted without proof. Asyndeton: Leaving out conjunctions between words, phrases, clauses.	15
6985171369	Attitude	The speaker's position on a subject as revealed through his or her tone.	16
6985172355	Audience	One's listener or readership; those to whom a speech or piece of writing is addressed.	17
6985172356	Authority	A reliable, respected source—someone with knowledge. E.g.: Professor/Professional in specific area.	18
6985173945	Bias	Prejudice or predisposition toward one side of a subject or issue.	19
6985174575	Cite	Identifying a part of a piece of writing as being derived from a source.	20
6985175740	Claim	An assertion, usually supported by evidence.	21
6985176650	Close reading	A careful reading that is attentive to organization, figurative language, sentence structure, vocabulary, and other literary and structural elements of a text.	22
6985177264	Colloquial/ism	An informal or conversational use of language.	23
6985178816	Common ground	Shared beliefs, values, or positions.	24
6985179646	Complex sentence	A sentence that includes one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.	25
6985180349	Concession	A reluctant acknowledgment or yielding.	26
6985181170	Connotation	That which is implied by a word, as opposed to the word's literal meaning (see denotation).	27
6985181171	Context	Words, events, or circumstances that help determine meaning.	28
6985182297	Coordination	Grammatical equivalence between parts of a sentence, often through a coordinating conjunction such as and, or but.	29
6985183092	Counterargument	A challenge to a position; an opposing argument.	30
6985183442	Cumulative sentence	An independent clause followed by subordinate clauses or phrases that supply additional detail.	31
6985183874	Declarative sentence	A sentence that makes a statement.	32
6985183875	Deduction	Reasoning from general to specific.	33
6985184686	Denotation	The literal meaning of a word; its dictionary definition. (E.g.: Aroma = smell)	34
6985185797	Diction	Word choice.	35
6985185803	Documentation	Bibliographic information about the sources used in a piece of writing.	36
6985189063	Elegiac	Mournful over what has passed or been lost; often used to describe tone. E.g.: Poems: Sylvia Plath	37
6985189798	Epigram	A brief witty statement. E.g.: "I can resist everything but temptation"	38
6985189801	Ethos	A Greek term referring to the character of a person; one of Aristotle's three rhetorical appeals (see logos and pathos). Credibility	39
6985190352	Figurative language	The use of tropes or figures of speech; going beyond literal meaning to achieve literary effect.	40
6985191193	Figure of speech	An expression that strives for literary effect rather than conveying a literal meaning.	41
6985191728	Hyperbole	Exaggeration for the purpose of emphasis.	42
6985192317	Imagery	Vivid use of language that evokes a reader's senses (sight, smell, taste, touch, hearing).	43
6985192777	Imperative sentence	A sentence that requests or commands.	44
6985192780	Induction	Reasoning from specific to general.	45
6985193397	Inversion	A sentence in which the verb precedes the subject.	46
6985193403	Irony	A contradiction between what is said and what is meant; incongruity between action and result.	47
6985194172	Juxtaposition	Placement of two things side by side for emphasis. E.g.: God and Satan // It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...	48
6985194748	Logos	A Greek term that means "word"; an appeal to logic; one of Aristotle's three rhetorical appeals (see ethos and pathos)	49
6985194749	Metaphor	A figure of speech or trope through which one thing is spoken of as though it were something else, thus making an implicit comparison.	50
6985195729	Metonymy	Use of an aspect of something to represent the whole.	51
6985196232	Occasion	An aspect of context; the cause or reason for writing.	52
7059361406	Oxymoron	A figure of speech that combines two contradictory terms.	53
7059361407	Paradox	A statement that seems contradictory but is actually true. E.g.: I can resist anything but temptation / I know one thing: that I know nothing.	54
7059361722	Parallelism	The repetition of similar grammatical or syntactical patterns.	55
7059362037	Parody	A piece that imitates and exaggerates the prominent features of another; used for comic effect or ridicule.	56
7059362562	Pathos	A Greek term that refers to suffering but has come to be associated with broader appeals to emotion; one of Aristotle's three rhetorical appeals (see ethos and logos).	57
7059362827	Persona	The speaker, voice, or character assumed by the author of a piece of writing.	58
7059362828	Personification	Assigning lifelike characteristics to inanimate objects.	59
7059364095	Polemic	An argument against an idea, usually regarding philosophy, politics, or religion.	60
7059364096	Polysyndeton	The deliberate use of a series of conjunctions.	61
7059364558	Premise	Major, minor Two parts of a syllogism. The concluding sentence of a syllogism takes its predicate from the major premise and its subject from the minor premise.	62
7059365609	Propaganda	A negative term for writing designed to sway opinion rather than present information.	63
7059365884	Purpose	One's intention or objective in a speech or piece of writing.	64
7059365885	Refute	To discredit an argument, particularly a counterargument.	65
7059366366	Rhetoric	The study of effective, persuasive language use; according to Aristotle, use of the "available means of persuasion."	66
7059367162	Rhetorical modes	Patterns of organization developed to achieve a specific purpose; modes include but are not limited to narration, description, comparison and contrast, cause and effect, definition, exemplification, classification and division, process analysis, and argumentation.	67
7059367166	Rhetorical question	A question asked more to produce an effect than to summon an answer.	68
7059367676	Rhetorical triangle	A diagram that represents a rhetorical situation as the relationship among the speaker, the subject, and the audience (see Aristotelian triangle).	69
7059368627	Satire	An ironic, sarcastic, or witty composition that claims to argue for something, but actually argues against it.	70
7059368628	Scheme	A pattern of words or sentence construction used for rhetorical effect.	71
7059369476	Sentence patterns	The arrangement of independent and dependent clauses into known sentence constructions—such as simple, compound, complex, or compound-complex.	72
7059369477	Sentence variety	Using a variety of sentence patterns to create a desired effect.	73
7059369890	Simile	A figure of speech that uses "like" or "as" to compare two things.	74
7059369891	Simple sentence	A statement containing a subject and predicate; an independent clause.	75
7059370171	Source	A book, article, person, or other resource consulted for information.	76
7059370541	Speaker	A term used for the author, speaker, or the person whose perspective (real or imagined) is being advanced in a speech or piece of writing.	77
7059370542	Straw man	A logical fallacy that involves the creation of an easily refutable position; misrepresenting, then attacking an opponent's position.	78
7059371906	Style	The distinctive quality of speech or writing created by the selection and arrangement of words and figures of speech.	79
7059372189	Subject	In rhetoric, the topic addressed in a piece of writing.	80
7059372190	Subordinate clause	Created by a subordinating conjunction, a clause that modifies an independent clause.	81
7059372433	Subordination	The dependence of one syntactical element on another in a sentence.	82
7059372889	Syllogism	A form of deductive reasoning in which the conclusion is supported by a major and minor premise (see premise; major, and minor).	83
7059373649	Syntax	Sentence structure.	84
7059373375	Synthesize	Combining or bringing together two or more elements to produce something more complex.	85
7059375295	Thesis	The central idea in a work to which all parts of the work refer.	86
7059375738	Thesis statement	A statement of the central idea in a work, may be explicit or implicit.	87
7059375739	Tone	The speaker's attitude toward the subject or audience.	88
7059376038	Topic sentence	A sentence, most often appearing at the beginning of a paragraph, that announces the paragraph's idea and often unites it with the work's thesis.	89
7059376039	Trope	Artful diction; the use of language in a nonliteral way; also called a figure of speech.	90
7059378426	Understatement	Lack of emphasis in a statement or point; restraint in language often used for ironic effect.	91
7059379110	Voice	In grammar, a term for the relationship between a verb and a noun (active or passive voice). In rhetoric, a distinctive quality in the style and tone of writing.	92
7059379727	Zeugma	A construction in which one word (usually a verb) modifies or governs—often in different, sometimes incongruent ways—two or more words in a sentence.	93