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Also apophthegm. A terse, pithy saying, akin to a proverb, maxim, or aphorism. aposiopesis A rhetorical device in which speech is broken off abruptly and the sentence is left unfinished. apostrophe A figure of speech in which a speaker breaks off from addressing the audience (e.g., in a play) and directs speech to a third party such as an opposing litigant or some other individual, sometimes ...
A definition states the meaning of a word using other words. This is sometimes challenging. Common dictionaries contain lexical descriptive definitions, but there are various types of definition – all with different purposes and focuses. A definition is a statement of the meaning of a term (a word, phrase, or other set of symbols).
A kenning (Old English kenning [cʰɛnːiŋɡ], Modern Icelandic [cʰɛnːiŋk]) is a circumlocution, an ambiguous or roundabout figure of speech, used instead of an ordinary noun in Old Norse, Old English, and later Icelandic poetry.
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first edition in 1884, traces the historical development of the English language, providing a comprehensive resource to ...
English orthography comprises the set of rules used when writing the English language, [1] [2] allowing readers and writers to associate written graphemes with the sounds of spoken English, as well as other features of the language. [3] English's orthography includes norms for spelling, hyphenation, capitalisation, word breaks, emphasis, and ...
Differences in scale are important to this meaning: for example, English grammar could describe those rules followed by every one of the language's speakers. [2] At smaller scales, it may refer to rules shared by smaller groups of speakers. A description, study, or analysis of such rules may also be known as a grammar, or as a grammar book.
For example, referring to actions of the U.S. president as "actions of the White House". Antonomasia - A kind of metonymy in which an epithet or phrase takes the place of a proper name. Simile – A form of speech that draws an explicit comparison (in contrast to metaphors) of one thing and another using the words "as" or "like" to bring ...
The Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms offers a much broader definition for zeugma by defining it as any case of parallelism and ellipsis working together so that a single word governs two or more parts of a sentence. [17] Vicit pudorem libido timorem audacia rationem amentia. (Cicero, Pro Cluentio, VI.15)