Rhetorical Terms Examples

What is rhetoric?

• The art of argument/persuasion
• The art of entertainment
• The art of analysis
• The art of informing

Choose the sentence that has parallel structure.

• The children laughed, jumped, and danced
• The children were laughing, jumped, and some were dancing.

A figure of reasoning in which one or more questions is/are asked and then answered, often at length, by one and the same speaker; raising and responding to one’s own question(s). A common usage is to ask the question at the beginning of a paragraph and then use the paragraph to answer it.

• Hyperbole
• Hypophora
• Imagery
• Inference

In ________, facts or events are unknown to a character in a play or piece of fiction but known to the reader, audience, or other characters in the work.

• Irony
• Verbal Irony
• Situational Irony
• Dramatic Irony

In ___________, events turn out the opposite of what was expected.

• Irony
• Verbal Irony
• Situational Irony
• Dramatic Irony

In _____________, the words literally state the opposite of the writer’s (or speaker’s) true meaning.

• Irony
• Verbal Irony
• Situational Irony
• Dramatic Irony

The contrast between what is stated explicitly and what is really meant. The difference between what appears to be and what actually is true.

• Irony
• Verbal Irony
• Situational Irony
• Dramatic Irony

When two words, phrases, images, ideas are placed close together or side by side for comparison or contrast.

• Invective
• Isocolon
• Jargon
• Juxtaposition

A special form of understatement, where the surface denial serves, through ironic contrast, to reinforce the underlying assertion

• Litotes
• Logical Fallacy
• Logos
• Loose Sentence

An appeal to an audience that uses logic, reasoning, evidence, and facts to support an argument. ________ appeals to the more rational side of the audience’s minds and provides support for the subject matter. 

• Litotes
• Logical Fallacy
• Logos
• Loose Sentence