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AP English Language
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Abstract | not concrete; pertaining to ideas and concepts |
| Aesthetic | attributes pertaining to the value of art for its own sake as form. |
| Allegory | Narrative form in which characters and actions have meanings outside themselves. |
| Alliteration | The repetition of initial consonant sounds or any vowel sounds within a formal grouping |
| Allusion | An indirect reference to a historical or literary figure, event or object to create a resonance in the reader. OR to apply a symbolic meaning to the character or object of which it consists. |
| Ambiguity | multiple meaning. Doing this intentionally may enhance. |
| Anachronism | An error in chronology |
| Anadiplosis | Repetition of an important word from one phrase (usually the last word) at the start of the next phrase. |
| Analogy | A comparison of two things that are essentially unlike but which can be shown to have similar properties. |
| Analytical | Subject is broken down into consistent parts and components are subjugated to detailed scrutiny |
| Anaphora | The regular repetition of the same word at the beginning of successive phrases or clauses. |
| Anecdote | Literally not for publication.A confidential tale |
| Antagonist | Character of force working in opposition to protagonist, or main character. |
| Antecedent | The word to which a pronoun refers. |
| Antihero | A protagonist who lacks heroic virtues, especially courage and honesty. |
| Antithesis | The juxtaposition of sharply contrasting ideas in balanced or parallel words or phrases. An idea opposed to another idea. |
| Aphorism | A short statement of doctrine of acknowledged principle. |
| Apology | Synonym of the word defense. |
| Apostrophe | A figure of speech in which a person, thing, or abstract quality is addressed as if present. |
| Pathos | Audience's anticipated emotional reaction |
| Ethos | The moral element that determines character's actions |
| Logos | The logical information persuaded |
| Argument | A series of statements including the premises and a conclusion drawn from those premises. |
| Assonance | The repetition of similar vowel sounds in a sequence of nearby words |
| Asyndeton | The omission of coordinating conjunctions, such as in a series. |
| Audience | The intended readers of writing and literature |
| Begging the Question | An unsupported assumption of something that has yet to be proved. |
| Bildungsroman | A novel about the education or psychological growth of the protagonist or main character |
| Canon | A critical standard. A catalog OR official list of authors works. |
| Carpe Diem | Seize the Day! |
| Catharsis | The purging or cleansing of spectators' or readers' emotions by means of emotional agitation |
| Chiasmus | Two phrases in which the syntax is the same but the placement of words is reversed or the crisscross effect in ironic plots of fiction and drama. |
| Claim | An assumption of something as fact |
| Clause | Group of structurally related words that have a subject and a verb |
| Climax | The highest point. The culmination of a rising suspense of action within a scene or overall plot of a novel or play. |
| Closure | Bringing to an end or conclusion |
| Collogquial | Informal Speech |
| Comma Splice | The result of the omission of a conjunction from a compound sentence so that the clauses have only a coma to seperate them. |
| Comment Section | Part of thesis that makes a point about the topic of the essay |
| Comparison | Focuses on the similarities between two or more ideas |
| Connotation | What is implied by a word |
| Consonance | A sound effect rising from the repetition or close occurrence of consonants within words or the occurrence of identical consonant sounds in stressed syllables whose vowel sounds differ.1 |
| Contradiction | A direct opposition between things |
| Contrast | Comparison of two pposites often helps dramatically to clarify the attributes of a thing or one's attitude towards a thing. |
| Convention | Any accepted practice, style, or structure |
| Critical Reading | Actively engaging with a text |
| Deductive reasonin | Reasoning from the general to the specific |
| Delayed Sentence | A sentence that witholds its main ideas until the end |
| Denotation | The specific meaning of a word, or the object that the word names, is the denotation of that word. |
| Dependent Clause | A sentence that can't stand on its own. |
| Deus ex machina | a device by with the god descends to rescue the hero. Greek drama |
| Devices | A word pattern or combination of words in a literary work to evoke a desired reaction in the reader |
| Diction | Choice and arrangement of words |
| Didactic | More intent on teaching a lesson than telling a story. |
| Digression | Movement away from the main story or theme in writing. Focusing on a minor character (EX) |
| Discourse | A formal discussion of a subject |
| Doppelganger | Another side of one's self or characters like oneself. |
| Drama | Performance by actors. |
| Dystopia | An imaginary place where people live dehumanized, often fearful lives. |
| Elegy | A poem in an elevated style, written in praise of and mourning for a specific dead person. |
| Epigraph | A brief quotation prefixed to a written work used to suggest its theme. |
| Epiphany | A sudden insight, to set the tone or suggest theme. |
| Epistolary | A pice of literature carried by letters |
| Epistrophe | Repetition of a word or words at the tend of two or more successive verses, clauses, or sentences |
| Epitaph | Any brief inscription in prose or verse on a tombstone. |
| Eulogy | A speech writing in praise of a person/thing; in honor of a deceased person. |
| Euphemisim | Substitution of milder or less direct expression for one that is blunt or real. Damn! dang! |
| Evidence | Facts and statistics interprested as reasonably as possible; primary texts and original documents |
| Exclamation | A type of interruption where the speaker/writer stops a sentence midway and addresses an individual who may/may not be present |
| Expletive | often set off by commas, single, short words to emphasize surrounding words |
| Explicatoin | The interpretation/analysis of a text |
| Exposition | Analysis of a subject; presenting the meaning or purpose of an issue |
| Expository Writing | writing that makes a statement by explaining or giving info |
| Fallacy | An argument that isn't valid |
| Faulty | An analogy that compares a fact with a similar point that is still an assumption |
| Figurative Language | Uses stylistic devices such as figures of speech to convey non-literal meanings |
| Flashback | Retrospection |
| Foil | A person that makes another person seem better by contrast |
| Foreshadow | To hint at or present things to come in a story or play |
| Formal/informal/colloquial | language that is lofty/dignifies-informal or colloquial is everyday speech |
| Fragment Sentence | A group of words that do not make a grammatical sentence |
| Genre | Literary forms such as tragedy, comedy, novel, or essay |
| Hamartia | Aristotle's term for the main characters tragic flaw or error in judgment |
| Hyperbole | An overstatement characterized by exaggerated language. |
| Imagery | Sensory details in a work; figurative language to evoke a feeling, describe an object. Involves any or all of the 5 senses. |
| Imperative | A sentence/word that relays a command |
| In Medias Res | In the middle of things. Opening a story in the middle of the action |
| Indefinite Pronoun | Unspecified persons/things |
| Independent Clause | A clause that can stand on its own in a sentence |
| Inductive | Specific to general reasoning |
| Inference | The process of arriving at a conclusion from a hint, implication, or suggestion. |
| Invective | the use of anger/insulting language in satirical writing. |
| Irony | Situation/statement characterized by significant difference between what is expected and what actually happens or what is meant |
| isocolon | Parallel structure in which parallel selements are similar not only in grammar but also language |
| Juxtaposition | placing of two items side by side to create a certain effect, reveal an attitude, or accomplish some other purpose |
| literal | The strict meaning of a word |
| Litote | Form of understatement in which the negative of the contrary is used to achieve emphasis/intensity "She is not a BAD cook" |
| Metacognition | thinking about your own thoughts as you encounter ideas in a written form |
| Metaphor | Comparison without using like or as |
| Metonymy | The use of a concrete word, rather than abstract expression to refer to a more abstract/complex word or idea |
| Mood | Feeling or ambiance resulting from a work |
| Motif | Created through description. Establishes feelings such as recurrent gloom, fear or hope |
| Narrative | Form of writing that tells a story |
| Narrative Device | Use of techniques such as flashbacks/ or digression in the telling of a story |
| Narrator | The "character" who tells the story |
| Nostalgia | Desire to return in thought or fact to a previous time |
| Onomatopoeia | a word capturing or approximately the sounds of what it describes |
| Opening | the first part or beginning of a pice of writing |
| Outline | a systematic listing of the main points of an essay |
| Overstatement | exaggerated language |
| Oxymoron | A concise paradox where two contradictory ideas are combined in a single word/phrase |
| Paradox | A statement that seems contradictory but is actually true. |
| Paragraph | A group of sentences that can develop one idea |
| Parallelism | Recurrent syntactical similarity- several parts of a sentence or several sentences are expressed alike to have equal importance/balance, rhythm, clarity to the sentence. |
| Paraphrase | Summarizing an idea in your own words |
| Paradoy | A humorous imitation of a particular style of writing with unusual content or ideas not typically expressed in that style. |
| Persona | The projected identity of the speaker in a literary text or essay |
| Personal/Reflective writing | writing written to examine and reflect on your own observation, feelings, and opinions |
| Personification | Treating an abstraction or nonhuman object as if it were a person by giving it human qualities |
| perspective | A character's view of the situation or events in the story |
| Point of View | The view the reader gets of the action and characters in a story |
| Predicate | A word/group of words that tells something about what the subject is or does |
| previewing | Skimming a text to get a general idea of the subject and a general idea of how to approach the text |
| Propaganda | Information/rumor deliberately spread to help or harm a person, group or institution |
| Prose | the ordinary form of written language without metrical structure as distinguished form poetry or verse |
| protagonist | The chief character in a work of literature |
| Realism | The literary practice of attempting to describe life and nature without idealization and without attention to detail |
| Reflective | A piece of writing that gives considered though to something |
| Repetition | Repeated |
| Retrospection | Looking back in things of the past |
| Rhetoric | The language of a work and its style, the art of persuasion |
| Rhetorical Dvice | Parallelism, metaphor, analogy, assonance, particular use of word patterns/styles used to clarify, make association and focus the writing in a piece of literature. |
| Run-on | Two or more independent clauses run together with no punctuation or conjunction |
| Sarcasm | A form of verbal irony |
| Satire | A mode of writing that mocks characters |
| Semicolon | punctuation used to separate complete sentences |
| Setting | Time place of the action in a story poem or play |
| Signal Words | Words that help guide the reader through the paragraph |
| Simili | A direct comparison between one thing to another usually using the words like or as to draw connection |
| Speaker | The person- not necessarily the author- who is the voice of the poem or story |
| Structure | The way an essay is organized as the order in which you present your ideas to the reader |
| Style | How you present your ideas |
| Subject | A word or group of words that identifies a person place or thing. |
| Subordinate | A clause that begins with a subordinator or a relative pronoun and cannot stand alone as a sentence |
| Subordinating conjunction | Introduces a clause that depends on the clause for its meaning |
| Subordination | An arrangment that makes one and more parts or a sentence secondary to and dependent on another part |
| Syllogism | A form of deduction. An extremly subtle sophisticated,or deceptive argument |
| Symbolism | A person, place, thing, event or pattern in a literary work that disguises itself and figuratively seomething is something else. |
| Synecdoche | A figure of speech in which a part signifies the whole such as "herd of Cattle" OR "hands on deck." |
| Syntax | The way words are put together to form phrases/ clauses and sentences |
| Theme | Central or dominant idea or concern/ the main idea, meaning |
| Thesis Statement | Focus statemtent of an essay |
| Tone | The attitude a literary work takes toward its subject/theme |
| Topic Section | The part of thethesis statement that identifies the topic of the essay |
| Topic Sentence | The sentence that identifies the main point of the paragraph |
| Transition words | Words and devices that bring unity, coherence to writing |
| Trope | The use of figurative language for artistic effect, overdone |
| Understatement | Deliberate expression of an idea or event as less important than it actually is |
| Utopia | An imaginary place of idea lperfection |
| Voice | The acknowledged source of words of the story; the speaker/ a "person" telling the story or poem |
| Wit | Quickness of intellect/talent for saying brilliant things that surprise/delight |
| Zeugma | Grammatically correct linkage of one subject with two or more verbs or a verb with two or more direct objects. The linking shows a relationship between ideas more clearly. For example; "with one touch she stole his heart, and his wallet." |
Created by:
akila.wolf
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