Rhetorical Devices: Allusion, Analogy, and Repetition

Rhetorical Devices:

Allusion, Analogy, and Repetition

Lesson 3.2

Multiple Choice

Is an allusion the same thing as an illusion?

• Yes

• No

What's the difference between an allusion and an illusion?

• An allusion is a noun which is a reference to something else. A similar word is the verb allude which means to refer to.

• An illusion is a noun that means a false idea or belief. It can also mean something we misinterpret with our senses or something with a deceptive appearance.

Allusion

An allusion is a reference to something else. It can be a book, movie, song, speech, person, historical event, common saying, or basically anything an author feels you would be familiar with and connect to the idea he/she is introducing or developing.

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This connection is not directly stated. You are meant to INFER the connection between the allusion and the idea.

We saw several examples of allusions in our poetry unit.

Examples of Allusions

1. You’re acting like such a Scrooge!

   This is an allusion to Dickens’s book A Christmas Carol. It means that the person is cheap and selfish, just like the character Scrooge from the story.

2. I lost my bus money, but, fortunately, a good Samaritan helped me out!

   This is an allusion to the Christian Biblical story of the good Samaritan. A good Samaritan is someone who helps others in need, just as the Samaritan does in the story.

3. "You don't get another chance; life is no Nintendo game."

   This is an allusion because Eminem is referring to how you get new lives in Nintendo games, but we really only have one life. (It is also a metaphor.)

Multiple Select

Which of these could be used to make an allusion?

There is more than one correct answer.

• works of literature

• mythology

• popular song

• common saying

Multiple Choice

What can you infer from the allusion in this Taylor Swift song?

‘that you were Romeo/you were throwing pebbles/And my Daddy said ‘ stay away from Juliet’ (Romeo and Juliet are characters in Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. Their families hated each other, but they were in love.)

• Her dad likes her new boyfriend.

• Her dad doesn't want her to date that boy.

• She doesn't like that boy so she told her dad to yell at him.

Multiple Choice

What can you infer from this allusion in a song by One Direction?

"Shot me out of the sky/you're my kryptonite/you keep making me weak yeah frozen and can't speak." (Hint: There is one only thing that can stop Superman.)

• Her love is like an airplane.

• Her love gives him strength.

• Her love is his weakness.

Multiple Choice

What can you infer from this allusion?

Chocolate was her Achilles' heel. (Achilles, a Greek soldier, was invincible except for the small spot on his heel which eventually brings about his death.)

• Chocolate makes her feet fat.

• Chocolate brings her power.

• Chocolate is her downfall.

Multiple Choice

Martin Luther King, Jr. gave a famous speech in which he repeatedly stated that he "has a dream." In the first paragraph of Thunberg's speech, she mentions also having a dream. Is this an allusion?

I am grateful for being with you here in the USA. A nation that, to many people, is the country of dreams. I also have a dream.

• Yes

• No

Multiple Choice

Is this an allusion in Paragraph 25? "Because quote 'it was a bad deal for the USA'"

• No. We don't know who said the quote.

• Yes. It mentions the USA.

• Yes. It is referring to a speech by President Trump.

Multiple Choice

Does Thunberg make allusions in this part of her speech?

"Think of the brave soldiers that rushed ashore in that first wave on Omaha Beach on D Day. Think of Martin Luther King and the 600 other civil rights leaders who risked everything to march from Selma to Montgomery. Think of President John F. Kennedy announcing in 1962 that America would 'choose to go to the moon in this decade...'"

• Yes

• No

Multiple Select

What allusions did Thunberg make?

Think of the brave soldiers that rushed shore in the first wave on Omaha Beach on D Day. Think of Martin Luther King and 600 other civil rights leaders who risked everything to march from Selma to Montgomery. Think of President John F. Kennedy announcing in 1962 that America would 'choose to go to the moon in this decade...'"

• She refers to the battle on Omaha Beach and D Day, important WWII events.

• She refers to the Civil Rights March from Selma to Montgomery.

• She refers to President Kennedy challenging us to go to the moon.

• She refers to the climate change battle in Congresss.

Multiple Choice

Why does Thunberg include these allusions in her speech?

• She wants to impress Congress with her knowledge of American history.

• She wants to show that climate change is impossible to stop.

• She wants to remind Congress that Americans have faced impossible challenges before and succeeded.

​Analogy

​An analogy is a comparison between two things to show how they are similar. It is like a simile or metaphor, but its purpose is different.

Analogies are used to make a point or to explain something harder by comparing it to something we already know.

Analogy Example #1

• In a Facebook post about climate change, actor and former governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger used an analogy to point out why we should support renewable energy.

"There are two doors. Behind Door Number One is a completely sealed room, with a regular, gasoline-fueled car. Behind Door Number Two is an identical completely sealed room, with an electric car. Both engines are running full blast.

I want you to pick a door to open, enter the room, and shut the door behind you. You have to stay in the room you choose for one hour. You cannot turn off the engine. You do not get a gas mask.

I'm guessing you chose Door Number Two, with the electric car, right? Door Number One is a fatal choice - who would ever want to breathe those fumes?

This is the choice the world is making right now."

Multiple Choice

What does Schwarzenegger compare in this analogy?

• Two different doors

• Surviving in a room full of car exhaust fumes to surviving in a world filled with greenhouse gases.

• Climate change to renewable energy

Multiple Choice

What argument about climate change does Schwarzenegger make with this analogy?

• We should not put cars behind closed doors.

• We may be making deadly choices by continuing to produce greenhouse gases.

• Electric cars are not better than cars that use gasoline.

​"The climate ship has definitely sailed: Even if we could eliminate all carbon emissions overnight, the planet's average temperature and sea level would not decrease in the coming decades because of the inertia built into the climate system. As with a massive ship, you can't wait until the last minute to start steering away from disaster. But even on the doomed Titanic, there would have been many more survivors if the right actions had been promptly taken, and the same is true today with global warming."

Analogy ​Example #2

​From "What we can learn about climate change from the Titanic" by Dawn Stover, February 15, 2019

Multiple Choice

What argument about climate change was the author trying to make with that analogy?

• Climate change affected the Titanic and caused it to sink.

• We shouldn't bother to fix climate change because it's too late.

• Even though we can't fix what has already happened, we can still prevent worse things from happening.

Analogy Example #3

​"Some of you may have heard that we have 12 years from 1 January 2018 to cut our carbon emissions in half. But I guess that hardly any of you have heard that there is a 50% chance of staying below a 1.5 degree Celsius of global temperature rise above pre-industrial levels. Fifty percent chance...so a 50% chance - a statistical flip of a coin - will most definitely not be enough. That would be impossible to morally defend. Would anyone of you step onto a plane if you knew it had more than a 50% chance of crashing? More to the point: Would you put your children on that flight?"

Multiple Choice

What is the analogy in Example #3?

• It compares facts and data to climate change.

• It makes a reference to a coins because they have two sides.

• It makes a comparison between our chances of controlling climate change to a flip of a coin.

Multiple Choice

What argument about climate change does Thunberg make with this analogy?

• A 50-50 chance is good so we don't need to act right now.

• We shouldn't be taking the risk of a 50% chance. We need to act now to increase our chances.

• We should flip a coin to decide whether or not to fight climate change.

Review: Repetition and Anaphora

Repetition is when a word or phrase is repeated on purpose to emphasize a point. It can be used anywhere in a text.

Anaphora is repetition of a word or phrase in the beginning of sentences or paragraphs.

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Multiple Choice

What does anaphora mean?

• It's the same as an analogy

• The repetition of a word or phrase in the beginning of sentences or paragraphs

• Repetition that can be found anywhere in the paragraph.

Multiple Choice

In paragraphs 33 through 35, Thunberg starts each allusion with the phrase "think of..." This is called

• Repetition

• Anaphora

• Analogy

Multiple Choice

Why does Thunberg repeat the IPCC's recommendations in Paragraphs 13, 20, and 26?

• To emphasize the point that countries need to meet those recommendations, and we are already behind.

• To sound more scientific and impress Congress with her knowledge.

• To prove that she has read and studied the report.