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A euphemism (/ ˈ juː f ə m ɪ z əm / YOO-fə-miz-əm) is an innocuous word or expression used in place of one that is deemed offensive or suggests something unpleasant. [1] Some euphemisms are intended to amuse, while others use bland, inoffensive terms for concepts that the user wishes to downplay.
Dead people in a graveyard being referred to as inhabitants is an example of catachresis. [8] Example from Alexander Pope's Peri Bathous, Or the Art of Sinking in Poetry: Masters of this [catachresis] will say, Mow the beard, Shave the grass, Pin the plank, Nail my sleeve. [9]
A euphemism is a mild, indirect, or vague term substituting for a harsher, blunter, or more offensive term.. It may also substitute a description of something or someone to avoid revealing secret, holy, or sacred names to the uninitiated, or to obscure the identity of the subject of a conversation from potential eavesdroppers.
Paradiastole, in a trope sense, (from Greek παραδιαστολή from παρά para "next to, alongside", and διαστολή diastole "separation, distinction") is the reframing of a vice as a virtue, often with the use of euphemism, [1] for example, "Yes, I know it does not work all the time, but that is what makes it interesting."
For example, Miró's 1925 painting "Photo: This is the Color of My Dreams" has the word "photo" to represent the image of his dreams. This painting comes from a series of paintings called peintures-poésies (paintings-poems) which reflect Miró's interest in dreams and the subconscious [38] and the relationship of words, images, and thoughts.
For example, the phrase, "John, my best friend" uses the scheme known as apposition. Tropes (from Greek trepein, 'to turn') change the general meaning of words. An example of a trope is irony, which is the use of words to convey the opposite of their usual meaning ("For Brutus is an honorable man; / So are they all, all honorable men").
Lodgings to Let, an 1814 engraving featuring a double entendre. He: "My sweet honey, I hope you are to be let with the Lodgins!" She: "No, sir, I am to be let alone".. A double entendre [note 1] (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, one of which is typically obvious, and the other often conveys a message that ...
Synecdoche is a rhetorical trope and a kind of metonymy—a figure of speech using a term to denote one thing to refer to a related thing. [9] [10]Synecdoche (and thus metonymy) is distinct from metaphor, [11] although in the past, it was considered a sub-species of metaphor, intending metaphor as a type of conceptual substitution (as Quintilian does in Institutio oratoria Book VIII).