A Sample of Self-Definers—Rhetorical & Poetic Devices and Figures of Speech: Part II
The SpecGram Book Elves™
Here is a seventeenth hand-curated selection from “Appendix A: A Self-Defining Linguistic Glossary”, a.k.a. “The only truly reliable cram sheet for your Linguistics 101 final”, from The Speculative Grammarian Essential Guide to Linguistics.
- litotes is not uncommon
- A good theory of metaphor is the Holy Grail of linguistics.
- onomoanopoeia
- non-contradictory oxymoron
- Peppering a paragraph with parachesis is an uppity, pitiable, and pathetic practice.
- This paradoxical statement is false.
- If I am using this paraprosdokian correctly—I’d be very surprised.
- Personification gets angry if you do it wrong.
- redundant pleonasm
- Polyptoton me no polyptota.
- Far be it from me to mention your overuse of praeteritio.
- A poor simile is as clear as mud.
- My kingdom for a snowclone!
- Synathroesmus is an old, tired, trite, clichéd, hackneyed, banal figure of speech.
- Tautograms tossed through the text triggered terror throughout the town.
- Tautologies are tautological.
- t-bloody-mesis
- She looked at the zeugma with suspicion and a magnifying glass.
More to come...
