APLANG Vocab Packet: R-S

Repetition - the reiteration of a word or phrase for emphasis

Revision - don't think you need this one, but if you do, message me.

Rhetoric/Rhetorical Purpose - Rhetoric is the art and logic of a written or spoken argument. Rhetorical writing is purposeful; examples of rhetorical purposes include to persuade, to analyze or to expose.

Rhetorical or stylistic devices - the specific language tools that an author uses to carry out a rhetorical strategy and thus achieve a purpose for writing. Some typical language devices include allusion, diction, imagery, syntax, selection of detail, figurative language and repetition.

Rhetorical Question - a question that is asked for the sake of argument. No direct answer is provided to rhetorical question; however, the probable answer to such a question is usually implied in the argument. Writers often use rhetorical questions to introduce topics they plan to discuss or to emphasize important points.

Rhetorical strategy - a plan of action or movement to achieve a goal. In rhetoric, strategy describes the way an author organizes words, sentences, and overall argument in order to achieve a particular purpose.

Satire - to ridicule or mock ideas, persons, events, or doctrines, or to make fun of human foibles or weaknesses. Gulliver's Travels are satires of particular people and events of Jonathan Swift's time.

Selection of Detail - the specific words, incidents, images or events the author uses to create a scene or narrative are referred to as the selection of detail.

Sequence - the order in which a writer presents information. writers commonly select chronological order, spatial order, order of importance, or order of complexity to arrange their points.

Simile - commonly used figure of speech which uses the words "like" or "as" e.g. He drank like a camel.

Slang - the unconventional, very informal language of particular subgroups of a culture. Slang, such as bummed, coke, split, dis, blow off, and hot are acceptable in formal writing only if it is used purposefully.

Slanting - the use of certain words or information that results in a biased point of view.

Speaker - the narrator of a story, poem or drama. The speaker should not be confused with the author, who creates the voice of the speaker; the speaker is a fictional persona.

Specific/General - General words name groups or classes of objects, qualities or actions. Specific words, in contrast, name individual objects, qualities or actions within a class or group. To some extent, the terms general and specific are relative. For example, dessert is a class of things. Pie, however is more specific than dessert but more general than pumpkin pie.
Good writing judiciously balances the general with the specific. Writing with too many general words is likely to be dull and lifeless; they do not create vivid responses in the reader's mind as concrete specific words can. However, writing that relies exclusively on specific words may lack focus and direction, the control that more general statements can provide.

Strategy - the means by which a writer achieves his or her purpose. May include rhetorical decisions the writer makes about organization, paragraph structure, syntax and diction.

Style - the individual manner in which a writer expresses his or her ideas. The author's particular selection of words, construction of sentences and arrangement of ideas create style.

Subject - its content, what the essay is about. Depending on the author's purpose and the constraints of space, a subject may range from one that is broadly conceived to one that is narrowly defined.

Syllogism - an argument that utilizes deductive reasoning and consists of a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion e.g.

• All trees that lose leaves are deciduous (major premise)
• Maple trees lose their leaves (minor premise)
• Therefore, maple trees are deciduous (conclusion)

Symbol - a person, place or thing that represents something beyond itself. the beaver = Canada. bald eagle = america Literary symbols often refer to or stand for a complex set of ideas. The moors in Wuthering Heights symbolize the wild and complex relationship of Catherine and Heathcliff.

Synonym - a word that has the same or nearly the same meaning as another word.

Syntax - the way words are arranged in a sentence. The following two sentences share a similar meaning but have different syntax, or word order. "The big blue sky beckoned her" "She was beckoned by the big blue sky"