Figurative Language
Language that communicates ideas
beyond the literal meaning of
words
Figurative language can make
descriptions and unfamiliar or
difficult ideas easier to
understand.
Figurative Language
The most common types are called
figures of speech.
They are ...
• simile
• metaphor
• personification
• hyperbole
Simile
A comparison between two things
that are basically dissimilar using
“like” or “as” to make the comparison
Example:
”We live meanly, like ants.”
- Henry David Thoreau
Metaphor
A comparison between two things that
are basically dissimilar in which one
thing becomes another
Example:
“Every few years / Tia Chucha would visit
the family / in a tornado of song”
- Luis Rodriguez, from “Tia Chucha”
Personification
The act of giving human qualities to
something that is not human
Example:
“But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust,
spoke only / That one word, as if his soul in that
one word he did outpour.”
- Edgar Allan Poe, from “The Raven”
Hyperbole
Exaggerating the truth for emphasis
or for humorous effect.
Example:
“I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.”
- common expression
Additional ways of
thinking about figurative
language
Style
The distinctive way in which a writer
uses language, from …
how sentences are put together to
choice of vocabulary to
use of figures of speech
Alliteration
The repetition of similar beginning
consonant sounds within a phrase or
sentence
Example:
“It is the smell when she makes room for you
on her side of the bed still warm from her
skin” (Cisneros 7).
Repetition
The act of repeating words or
phrases for dramatic effect
Example:
In “Hairs,” the words “hair”, “holding you”, and
“rain” are repeated throughout.
Imagery
Images and/or details that
emphasize our senses (sight, sound,
smell, taste, touch) to recreate a
scene for the reader.
Example:
“The snoring, the rain, and Mama’s hair that
smelled like bread” (Cisneros 7).