Use FIDDLS to help you remember what can be included in the DOES of your rhetorical analyses
F-FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE: Refers to the use of non-literal language for effect and emphasis. Simile:
compares using like or as. Metaphor: compares unlike objects but does not use like or as. Personification:
applies human qualities to objects, ideas or animals. Hyperbole: exaggerates for the purpose of emphasis.
Onomatopoeia: uses words that sound like the things they name. Alliteration: repeats initial consonant of
consecutive words ("Sweet scented stuff."). Assonance: repeats internal vowel sounds of consecutive
words. ("The clown laughed around town."). Oxymoron: associates two contrary terms ("wise fool").
Paradox: reveals a deeper truth despite its false-sound ("Each man kills the thing he loves."). Allusion: a
reference to some other work used to provide greater depth to a work (The character Anvil eats apples in
Tucker’s tree invites a Biblical reading of “White Circle”). Pun: a play on words to enhance meaning or
humor (The dialogue at the start of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar is full of puns on the word soul/sole.)
I-IMAGERY: A word or phrase representing something that can be seen, touched, tasted, smelled, or felt.
You could write about a writer's gustatory images, or his/her visual images, or his/her kinetic images, or
her auditory images, etc. Once you've decided what sense is being accessed, then think about the
appropriateness of that sense for conveying the meaning of the image.
D-DETAILS: facts that are included as well as those that are omitted. AP essay prompts sometimes
ask you to evaluate the writer's use of it. In this form of analysis, you'll look critically at what the writer
chose to include as a way of telling the story, making an argument or painting the picture.
D-DICTION: The choice of words in oral and written discourse. Word choice includes common speech,
poetic, lofty, lowly, academic, religious, etc. Look at the words that jump out at you. Here are some more
ways to evaluate it: monosyllabic or polysyllabic. Words can be mainly colloquial or informal, formal or
old-fashioned. Words can be mainly denotative or connotative. Words can be concrete or abstract. Words
can be euphonious or cacophonous. Words can sound negative or positive.
L-LANGUAGE: Refers to the overall use of language, as opposed to isolated use of diction. Examples of
descriptions of this include the following: artificial, pompous, ostentatious, moralistic, puritanical,
righteous, colloquial, vernacular, obscure, concrete, obtuse, dull-witted, undiscerning, connotative,
suggestive, everyday, common, cultured, cultivated, refined, pedantic, didactic, scholastic, bookish,
detached, plain, emotional, poetic, lyric, melodious, romantic, esoteric, precise, euphemistic, insincere,
affected, pretentious, exact, precise, provincial, rustic, unpolished, figurative, scholarly, intellectual,
academic, formal, academic, conventional, sensuous, passionate, luscious, grotesque, simple, clear,
intelligible, homespun, folksy, rustic, slang, idiomatic, insipid, tame, dull, trite, common, banal,
stereotyped, informal, casual, relaxed, learned, educated, experienced, vulgar, coarse, indecent, tasteless.
S-SYNTAX: refers to the organization and arrangement of language into meaningful structure, usually at
the level of a sentences and paragraphs. Analyze the way a writer chooses to join his/her words into
phrases, clauses, and sentences. It is the structural or grammatical elements and is not the same as diction.
In the multiple choice section of the AP exam, expect to be asked some questions about how an author
manipulates this. In the essay section, you will need to analyze how syntax produces effects (what it
does). Consider the following patterns and structures:
-Sentence length: why is the sentence length effective for conveying the idea or theme?
-Sentence beginnings: do you see a pattern in their arrangement?
-Sentence type to convey attitude: declarative, imperative, interrogative, exclamatory?
-Sentence type: simple or compound or complex or loose or periodic sentence?
-Sentences that include rhetorical questions, juxtaposition, parallelism repetition?
-Punctuation involves Ellipses, Dash, Semicolon, Colon, Capitalization, Exclamations?