AP Language Flashcards

Terms needed for success on the AP Language and Composition Exam

8420464472	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
8420464473	Antithesis	the presentation of two contrasting images. The ideas are balanced by phrase, clause, or paragraphs. "To be or not to be . . ." "It was the best of times; it was the worst of times . . ." "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country . . ."	1
8420464474	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
8420464475	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
8420464476	Synecdoche	. a figure of speech that utilizes a part as representative of the whole. "All hands on deck" is an example.	4
8420464477	Hyperbole	a figure of speech using deliberate exaggeration or overstatement	5
8420464478	Anaphora	repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences in a row. This is a deliberate form of repetition and helps make the writer's point more coherent.	6
8420464479	Euphony	the pleasant, mellifluous presentation of sounds in a literary work.	7
8420464480	Theme	The central idea or message of a work, the insight it offers into life. Usually, __ is unstated in fictional works, but in nonfiction, the __ may be directly stated, especially in expository or argumentative writing.	8
8420464481	Metonomy	a term from the Greek meaning "changed label" or "substitute name" __ is a figure of speech in which the name of one object is substituted for that of another closely associated with it. For example: a news release that claims "The White House declared" rather than "The President declared"	9
8420464482	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.	10
8420464483	Transition	a word or phrase that links one idea to the next and carries the reader from sentence to sentence, paragraph to paragraph.	11
8420464484	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.	12
8420464485	Cacophony	harsh and discordant sounds in a line or passage in a literary word.	13
8420464486	Metaphor	a direct comparison between dissimilar things. "Your eyes are stars" is an example.	14
8420464487	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.	15
8420464488	Begging the Question	Often called circular reasoning, __ occurs when the believability of the evidence depends on the believability of the claim.	16
8420464489	Invective	an emotionally violent, verbal denunciation or attack using strong, abusive language.	17
8420464490	Understatement	the opposite of exaggeration. It is a technique for developing irony and/or humor where one writes or says less than intended.	18
8420464491	Either-or reasoning	When the writer reduces an argument or issue to two polar opposites and ignores any alternatives.	19
8420464492	Homily	This term literally means "sermon," but more informally, it can include any serious talk, speech, or lecture involving moral or spiritual advice.	20
8420464493	Pedantic	An adjective that describes words, phrases, or general tone that is overly scholarly, academic, or bookish.	21
8420464494	Causal Relationship	In __, a writer asserts that one thing results from another. To show how one thing produces or brings about another is often relevant in establishing a logical argument.	22
8420464495	Equivocation	When a writer uses the same term in two different senses in an argument.	23
8420464496	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.	24
8420464497	Euphemism	a more acceptable and usually more pleasant way of saying something that might be inappropriate or uncomfortable. "He went to his final reward" is a common __ for "he died." They are also used to obscure the reality of the situation.	25
8420464498	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.	26
8420464499	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.	27
8420464500	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.	28
8420464501	Alliteration	The repetition of initial consonant sounds, such as "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers."	29
8420464502	Epigraph	The use of a quotation at the beginning of a work that hints at its theme. Hemingway begins The Sun Also Rises with two. One of them is "You are all a lost generation" by Gertrude Stein.	30
8420464503	Periodic Sentence	A sentence that presents its central meaning in a main clause at the end. The independent clause is preceded by a phrase or clause that cannot stand alone. The effect is to add emphasis and structural variety.	31
8420464504	Narrative	The telling of a story or an account of an event or series of events.	32
8420464505	Ethos	an appeal based on the character of the speaker. An __-driven document relies on the reputation of the author.	33
8420464506	Situational Irony	a type of irony in which events turn out the opposite of what was expected.	34
8420464507	Consonance	Repetition of a consonant sound within two or more words in close proximity.	35
8420464508	Pathos	an appeal based on emotion.	36
8420464509	Syllogism	From the Greek for "reckoning together," a __ is a deductive system of formal logic that presents two premises that inevitably lead to a sound conclusion.	37
8420464510	Logos	an appeal based on logic or reason	38
8420464511	Verbal Irony	In this type of irony, the words literally state the opposite of the writer's true meaning	39
8420464512	Anecdote	A story or brief episode told by the writer or a character to illustrate a point.	40
8420464513	Abstract Language	Language describing ideas and qualities rather than observable or specific things, people, or places.	41
8420464514	Ad Hominem	In an argument, this is an attack on the person rather than on the opponent's ideas. It comes from the Latin meaning "against the man."	42
8420464515	Denotation	the literal or dictionary meaning of a word	43
8420464516	Cumulative	Sentence which begins with the main idea and then expands on that idea with a series of details or other particulars	44
8420464517	Dramatic Irony	In this type of irony, facts or events are unknown to a character in a play or a piece of fiction but known to the reader, audience, or other characters in the work	45
8420464518	Parody	A work that closely imitates the style or content of another with the specific aim of comic effect and/or ridicule.	46
8420464519	Connotation	the interpretive level or a word based on its associated images rather than its literal meaning.	47
8420464520	Repetition	The duplication, either exact or approximate, or any element of language, such as sound, word, phrase, clause, sentence, or grammatical pattern.	48
8420464521	Syntax	The grammatical structure of prose and poetry.	49
8420464522	Assonance	Repetition of a vowel sound within two or more words in close proximity	50
8420464523	Voice	can refer to two different areas of writing. One refers to the relationship between a sentence's subject and verb (active and passive). The second refers to the total "sound" of the writer's style.	51
8420464524	Infer	To draw a reasonable conclusion from the information presented.	52
8420464525	Argument	A single assertion or a series of assertions presented and defended by the writer	53
8420464526	Allusion	A reference contained in a work	54
8420464527	Genre	The major category into which a literary work fits. The basic divisions of literature are prose, poetry, and drama.	55
8420464528	Stream-of-consciousness	This is a narrative technique that places the reader in the mind and thought process of the narrator, no matter how random and spontaneous that may be.	56
8420464529	Allegory	A work that functions on a symbolic level	57
8420464530	Explication	The act of interpreting or discovering the meaning of a text. __ usually involves close reading and special attention to figurative language.	58
8420464531	Parallelism	refers to the grammatical or rhetorical framing of words, phrases, sentences, or paragraphs to give structural similarity.	59
8420464532	Semantics	The branch of linguistics that studies that meaning of words, their historical and psychological development, their connotations, and their relation to one another.	60
8420464533	Rhetorical Modes	The flexible term describes the variety, the conventions, and the purposes of the major kinds of writing.	61
8420464534	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.	62
8420464535	Figurative Language	Writing or speech that is not intended to carry literal meaning and is usually meant to be imaginative and vivid.	63
8420464536	Example	an individual instance taken to be representative of a general pattern	64
8420464537	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.	65
8420464538	Narrative Device	This term describes the tools of the storyteller, such as ordering events to that they build to climatic movement or withholding information until a crucial or appropriate moment when revealing in creates a desired effect.	66
8420464539	Ethical Appeal	When a writer tries to persuade the audience to respect and believe him or her based on a presentation of image of self through the text.	67
8420464540	Exposition	The purpose of this rhetorical mode is to explain and analyze information by presenting an idea, relevant evidence, and appropriate discussion.	68
8420464541	Attitude	the relationship an author has toward his or her subject, and/or his or her audience	69
8420464542	Backing	Support or evidence for a claim in an argument	70
8420464543	Ellipsis	Indicated by a series of three periods, the __ indicates that some material has been omitted from a given text.	71
8420464544	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.	72
8420464545	Didactic	writing whose purpose is to instruct or to teach. A ___ work is usually formal and focuses on moral or ethical concerns.	73
8420464546	Ambiguity	an event or situation that may be interpreted in more than one way.	74
8420464547	Narration	The purpose of this type of rhetorical mode is to tell the story or narrate an event or series of events.	75
8420464548	Rhetoric	from the Greek for "orator," this term describes the principle governing the art of writing effectively, eloquently, and persuasively.	76
8420464549	Third Person Limited Omniscient	This type of point of view presents the feelings and thoughts of only one character, presenting only the actions of all remaining characters	77
8420464550	Third Person Omniscient	In ___, the narrator, with a godlike knowledge, presents the thoughts and actions of any or all characters.	78
8420464551	Comic Relief	the inclusion of a humorous character or scene to contrast with the tragic elements of a work, thereby intensifying the next tragic event.	79
8420464552	Character	those who carry out the action of the plot in literature. Major, minor, static, and dynamic are the types.	80
8420464553	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.	81
8420464554	Antecedent	the word, phrase, or clause to which a pronoun refers.	82
8420464555	Style	an evaluation of the sum of the choices an author makes in blending diction, syntax, figurative language, and other literary devices.	83
8420464556	Thesis	The sentence or group of sentences that directly expresses the author's opinion, purpose, meaning, or proposition.	84
8420464557	Authority	Arguments that draw on recognized experts or persons with highly relevant experience.	85
8420464558	Chiasmus	Arrangement of repeated thoughts in the pattern of X Y Y X. It is often short and summarizes a main idea.	86
8420464559	Deconstruction	a critical approach that debunks single definitions of meaning based on the instability of language. It "is not a dismantling of a structure of a text, but a demonstration that it has already dismantled itself."	87
8420464560	Balance	a situation in which all parts of the presentation are equal, whether in sentences or paragraphs or sections of a longer work.	88
8420464561	Conflict	a clash between opposing forces in a literary work, such as man vs. man; man vs. nature; man vs. God; man vs. self	89
8420464562	Tone	Similar to mood, __ describes the author's attitude toward his or her material, the audience, or both.	90
8420464563	Prose	One of the major divisions of genre, ___ refers to fiction and nonfiction, including all its forms, because they are written in ordinary language and most closely resemble everyday speech.	91
8420464564	Dialect	the recreation of regional spoken language, such as a Southern one. Hurston uses this in Their Eyes Were Watching God.	92
8420464565	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.	93
8420464566	Wit	In modern usage, intellectually amusing language that surprises and delights. Usually uses terse language that makes a pointed statement.	94
8420464567	Point of View	In literature, the perspective from which a story is told.	95
8420464568	Deduction	The process of moving from a general rule to a specific example.	96
8420464569	Annotation	explanatory notes added to a text to explain, cite sources, or give bibliographical data.	97
8420464570	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.	98
8420464571	Diction	the author's choice of words that creates tone, attitude, and style, as well as meaning	99