AP ENGLISH LITERATURE
Terms: Rhetorical Devices
1. Allusion: a brief reference to a commonly known historical or literary figure or
work
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2. Analogy: a description or explanation of something unfamiliar through a
description of something more familiar
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3. Anaphora: the repetition of the same word or words at the start of two or more
lines of poetry
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4. Anticlimax: the placement of details of lesser importance where something
greater is expected
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5. Antithesis: the use of contrasting words, clauses, sentences, or ideas, balancing
one against the other in a strong opposition.
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6. Catalog: the use of lists of people, things, or attributes
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7. Incongruity: the linking of two incompatible things, often used humorously
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8. Incremental repetition: the use of repetition to effect successive minor changes in
order to enhance and intensify the meaning
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AP ENGLISH LITERATURE
Terms: Rhetorical Devices
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9. Oxymoron: a combination of ostensibly self-contradictory words
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10. Paradox: a seemingly contradictory statement that is in fact well-founded,
pointing toward the truth
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11. Parallelism: the presentation of coordinate ideas in a coordinate manner,
developing one element of equal importance with another similar element
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12. Pun: a play on words based on two similarly sounding words that have
different meanings
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13. Rhetorical accent: a stress on what would normally be an unaccented syllable,
to clarify the meaning or intention of a sentence
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14. Rhetorical question: a question asked for effect, not to elicit a reply, to which the
answer is almost always negative
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15. Structure: the plot or plan of a text
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16. Turn (Volta): a change in thought signaled by words like but, however, yet, etc.
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AP ENGLISH LITERATURE
Terms: Rhetorical Devices
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