Language devices Flashcards
Flattery
Compliments to someone (with the possible intention of wanting something from them)
Opinion
A personal opinion that may or may not relate to reality. “I believe that the car was red.” “Students should pay more for their own books.”
Fact
A sentence that is considered to be objectively true (i.e., independent of opinion).
Philosophically, this can be more slippery than at first understood…)
Hyperbole
Use of exaggeration; e.g., “For the millionth time stop exaggerating!”
Imperative language
Command language such as “Sit down!” “Don’t laugh!” “Shut up! And get on with your work!”
We hear this a lot at school.
Triples or the rule of three
se of three words, ideas, or phrases to help the reader recall the information or to emphasise a point. Churchill: “I have nothing to offer but ‘blood, sweat, and tears’”
Emotive language
general use of language designed to have an emotional impact - to make an appeal to your heart.
‘Abandoned children found in filthy, flea-infested flat’ (bbc bitesize example, great to say out loud)
Philosophically this is considered a fallacy - just because someone appeals to the heart to encourage you to act in a way does not mean that the action will be good or
Use of statistics of numbers (why?)
“The average income is £27,200 in the UK….”
- possibly used to surprise or shock: “Teenage pregnancy rates in England and Wales have almost halved in the last eight years, plummeting to the lowest level since records began.”
- factual, sounds authoritative…backing up the article with data. PROBLEM: statistics can be highly manipulated because it depends on how they are constructed.
Rhetorical question:
A question not expecting an answer from the audience/reader
Used to introduce a topic.
Personification
giving an object (or animal) human characteristics or feelings
The cat mused upon the death of the mouse.
The table waited patiently for the guests to arrive.
The mountain stared down ominously at the climbers.
Pathetic fallacy
The description of the atmosphere reflects the emotions of the characters in a story.
“It was a dark, stormy night, when the murderer entered the old castle…” [Think how this used in films…]
Oxymoron
two or more contradictory terms, e.g, “deafening silence” “lazy worker” “poor rich girl”
Setting
The context in which the story takes place
- historical? fantasy?
Describe the situation in which the play/novel/ or even poem takes place.
-what time period? contemporary, historical,
Mood or atmosphere
The general atmosphere that the author creates.
- suspense, fear, mysterious, exciting, adventurous, thrilling, satirical, pantomime, dark, lonely, miserable, hopeless, anarchic, loving, kind, idyllic
Characterisation
How an author may use traditional archetypes such as an innocent person, sly, evil, helpless, humorous, sinister, manipulating, trustworthy, untrustworhty.
Other characters are not stereotypes, these tend to be used in more modern writings - we don’t know what’s going to happen to them! The character develops with the story line. ALSO THINK OF NARRATOR….
