1. Stylistic devices/ figures of speech
BY: Makenzie Scott

2. How to analyze figures of speech
Identify the stylistic device.
Explain how it works in your particular context.
Explain its function or its function on the reader.
Example:
“Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under it.”
Comparison: act innocent and nice, not showing your true evil intentions.
Function: Creates a vivid mental image in the reader’s mind.

3. Functions of stylistic devices
Catch the reader’s attention/ arouse the reader’s interest.
Create a vivid mental image.
Ex: Personification, Metaphor, Symbol, Comparison/ Simile
Make the reader smile and is meant to be funny.
Ex: Irony, Exaggeration
Make the reader think.
Ellipsis, Paradox
Emphasize or put an emphasis on a certain aspect/fact
Ex: Repetition, Alliteration

4. More Functions of stylistic devices
Focus the reader’s attention on a certain fact.
Ex: Repetition, Anaphora
Express criticism.
Ex: Irony, Hyperbole
Express the author’s opinion.
Ex: Irony, Exaggeration
Entertain the reader.

5. Most common stylistic devices
IMAGES: Comparison, Metaphor, Personification, Symbol
SOUND: Alliteration, Repetition of a sound, Onomatopoeia
STRUCTURE: Anaphora, Parallelism, Enumeration, Antithesis, Ellipsis
OTHERS: rhetorical questions, Paradox, Exaggeration, Understatement, Irony, Euphemism

6. IMAGES Comparison/ Simile
Ex: Chris was an excellent runner and as fast as a race horse.
Uses the words, “like” or “as.”
Metaphor
Ex: Chris, the speeding bullet, raced along the street.
A comparison without “like” or “as.”
Personification
Ex: The sun shone brightly as if she were shining for me alone.
Giving inanimate objects human qualities.
Symbol
Ex: White dove = peace
Something concrete stands for an abstract idea

7. SOUND Alliteration Ex: She sells seashells by the seashore.
Repetition of identical consonants at the beginning of two or more words.
Repetition of a Sound
Ex: With steely insistence, he repeatedly asked the police….
Consonance: repetition of a consonant sound
Assonance: repetition of a vowel sound
Onomatopoeia
Ex: The steaks sizzled, Croaking frogs.
Imitation of a sound in the spelling/ pronunciation of a word

8. Structure
Anaphora
Ex: A man without ambition is dead. A man without love is dead. A man without….
Repetition of a sequence of words at the beginning of neighboring clauses.
Parallelism/ Repetition
Ex: The brats who broke her window, mocked her daughter, beat up her son, and invaded her garden……
Certain sentence structure is repeated.

9. Structure continued Enumeration
Ex: I came up with three reasons. First, this is my first reason. Second, this is my second reason. Third, this is my third reason.
Can be a list of items, also can be separated by structural words: first, second, third.
Antithesis
Ex: Many are called, few are chosen
Putting contrasting ideas next to each other, usually with the same sentence structure.
Ellipsis
Ex: “More often than not, it is clothes that wear us, and not we, them.”
Deliberately leaving out parts of the structure.

10. others Rhetorical Question
Ex: Was there really nothing they could do about it?
A question to which the answer is obvious both to the writer and the reader.
Paradox
Ex: The closer we are together, the further we are apart.
A statement which seems nonsensical but makes sense on a deeper level.
Exaggeration/ Hyperbole
Ex: “I have told you a thousand times.”
A strong overstatement

11. Others continued Understatement
Ex: We may have slightly different opinions about the debate.
A statement is deliberately weakened.
Irony
Ex: You look so good today.
Saying one thing and meaning the exact opposite. The harsher form is sarcasm.
Euphemism
Ex: I’m between jobs.
Replacing an unpleasant word with a more agreeable term.