Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Lit Terms #1

allegory:a story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one.
alliteration:the occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words.
allusion:an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference.
ambiguity:uncertainty or inexactness of meaning in language.
anachronism:a thing belonging or appropriate to a period other than that in which it exists, esp. a thing that is conspicuously old-fashioned.
analogy:a comparison between two things, typically on the basis of their structure and for the purpose of explanation or clarification
analysis:a method in which a work or idea is separated into its parts, and those parts given rigorous and detailed scrutiny
anaphora:a device or repetition in which a word or words are repeated at the beginning of two or more lines, phrases, clauses, or sentences
anecdote: a very short story used to illustrate a point
antagonist:a person or force opposing the protagonist in a drama or narrative
antithesis:a person or thing that is the direct opposite of someone or something else
aphorism: a pithy observation that contains a general truth
apologia:a formal written defense of one's opinions or conduct
apostrophe:a figure of speech in which an absent or dead person, an abstract quality, or something inanimate or nonhuman is addressed directly
argument:the process of convincing a reader by proving either the truth or the falsity of an idea or proposition; also, the thesis or proposition itself
assumption:the act of supposing, or taking for granted that a thing is true
audience:the intended listener or listeners
characterization:the means by which a writer reveals a character's personality
chiasmus:a rhetorical or literary figure in which words, grammatical constructions, or concepts are repeated in reverse order, in the same or a modified form

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