Rhetorical Devices Quiz

Rhetorical Devices

• Metaphor: Implied comparison, doesn't use "like" or "as"

  • Example: "Many students went down in flames" on the final exam.

• Simile: Explicit comparison, uses "like" or "as"

  • Example: "He had a posture like a question mark."

• Personification: Giving human qualities to objects or concepts

  • Example: "The ground thirsts for rain." / "Peace is waiting to greet us."

• Hyperbole: Exaggerated statements for emphasis

  • Example: "I'm so full I feel like I weigh three thousand pounds."

• Liotes: Deliberate understatement for comic effect or emphasis

  • Example: "Kids would occasionally like to be anywhere else but school."

• Irony: Using words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning

  • Example: "I was simply overjoyed at having to return to school."

• Oxymoron: Combining contradictory words

  • Example: "sweet pain," "cruel kindness"

• Paradox: A seemingly contradictory statement containing truth

  • Example: "He is really only guilty of being innocent."

• Alliteration: Repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words

  • Example: "The setting sun seemed so serene."

• Anaphora: Repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses

  • Example: "Let us march to the realization of the American dream. Let us march on segregated housing."

• Parallel Structure: Repeating a grammatical structure in sentences.

• Example: "Many people use drugs as socializing tools, as a way of meeting new people, and as a way of becoming popular."

• Rhetorical Question: A question whose answer is implied or known.

  • Example: "Wasn't James Dean a symbol of Hollywood?"

• Metonymy: A part of something represents the whole.

  • Example: "Give us this day our daily bread" / "Too many hands in the pot ruins the broth."

Other Rhetorical Devices

• Chiasmus: Crisscrossing of successive phrases or clauses

  • Example: "Fair is foul, foul is fair."

• Allusion: Reference to something the audience is expected to understand

  • Example: "Drew Barrymore is the Shirley Temple of the 1980s"

• Pun: Play on words

  • Example: "If we don't hang together, we'll all certainly hang separately."

• Onomatopoeia: Words whose sounds echo their meaning

  • Example: "Crash," "slam," "hush," "click"

• Enumeration: Listing points in numerical order

  • Example: "Firstly, I would like to say that... Secondly, ... Thirdly..."

• Colloquialism: Common words used instead of formal ones

  • Example: "cop" instead of "police officer"

• Euphemism: Substituting a more delicate word for a harsh one.

  • Example: "Your pet passed away" instead of "died"