AP English Exam: 101 Key Terms

On this page, you'll find brief definitions of grammatical, literary, and rhetorical terms that have appeared on the multiple-choice and essay portions of the AP* English Language and Composition exam. For examples and more detailed explanations of the terms, follow the links to expanded articles.

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100 Key Terms Used in the Study of Grammar

By Richard Nordquist

_{*AP is a registered trademark of the College Board, which neither sponsors nor endorses this glossary.}

• Ad Hominem: An argument based on the failings of an adversary rather than on the merits of the case; a logical fallacy that involves a personal attack.
• Adjective: The part of speech (or word class) that modifies a noun or a pronoun.
• Adverb: The part of speech (or word class) that modifies a verb, adjective, or another adverb.
• Allegory: Extending a metaphor so that objects, persons, and actions in a text are equated with meanings that lie outside the text.
• Alliteration: The repetition of an initial consonant sound.
• Allusion: A brief, usually indirect reference to a person, place, or event—real or fictional.
• Ambiguity: The presence of two or more possible meanings in any passage.
• Analogy: Reasoning or arguing from parallel cases.
• Anaphora: The repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or verses.
• Antecedent: The noun or noun phrase referred to by a pronoun.
• Antithesis: The juxtaposition of contrasting ideas in balanced phrases.
• Aphorism: (1) A tersely phrased statement of a truth or opinion. (2) A brief statement of a principle.
• Apostrophe: A rhetorical term for breaking off discourse to address some absent person or thing.
• Appeal to Authority: A fallacy in which a speaker or writer seeks to persuade not by giving evidence but by appealing to the respect people have for a famous person or institution.
• Appeal to Ignorance: A fallacy that uses an opponent's inability to disprove a conclusion as proof of the conclusion's correctness.
• Argument: A course of reasoning aimed at demonstrating truth or falsehood.
• Assonance: The identity or similarity in sound between internal vowels in neighboring words.
• Asyndeton: The omission of conjunctions between words, phrases, or clauses (opposite of polysyndeton).
• Character: An individual (usually a person) in a narrative (usually a work of fiction or creative nonfiction).
• Chiasmus: A verbal pattern in which the second half of an expression is balanced against the first but with the parts reversed.
• Circular Argument: An argument that commits the logical fallacy of assuming what it is attempting to prove.
• Claim: An arguable statement, which may be a claim of fact, value, or policy.
• Clause: A group of words that contains a subject and a predicate.
• Climax: Mounting by degrees through words or sentences of increasing weight and in parallel construction with an emphasis on the high point or culmination of a series of events.
• Colloquial: Characteristic of writing that seeks the effect of informal spoken language as distinct from formal or literary English.
• Comparison: A rhetorical strategy in which a writer examines similarities and/or differences between two people, places, ideas, or objects.
• Complement: A word or word group that completes the predicate in a sentence.
• Concession: An argumentative strategy by which a speaker or writer acknowledges the validity of an opponent's point.
• Confirmation: The main part of a text in which logical arguments in support of a position are elaborated.
• Conjunction: The part of speech (or word class) that serves to connect words, phrases, clauses, or sentences.
• Connotation: The emotional implications and associations that a word may carry.
• Coordination: The grammatical connection of two or more ideas to give them equal emphasis and importance. Contrast with subordination.
• Deduction: A method of reasoning in which a conclusion follows necessarily from the stated premises.
• Denotation: The direct or dictionary meaning of a word, in contrast to its figurative or associated meanings.
• Dialect: A regional or social variety of a language distinguished by pronunciation, grammar, and/or vocabulary.
• Diction: (1) The choice and use of words in speech or writing. (2) A way of speaking usually assessed in terms of prevailing standards of pronunciation and elocution.
• Didactic: Intended or inclined to teach or instruct, often excessively.
• Encomium: A tribute or eulogy in prose or verse glorifying people, objects, ideas, or events.
• Epiphora: The repetition of a word or phrase at the end of several clauses. (Also known as epistrophe.)
• Epitaph: (1) A short inscription in prose or verse on a tombstone or monument. (2) A statement or speech commemorating someone who has died: a funeral oration.
• Ethos: A persuasive appeal based on the projected character of the speaker or narrator.
• Eulogy: A formal expression of praise for someone who has recently died.
• Euphemism: The substitution of an inoffensive term for one considered offensively explicit.
• Exposition: A statement or type of composition intended to give information about (or an explanation of) an issue, subject, method, or idea.
• Extended Metaphor: A comparison between two unlike things that continues throughout a series of sentences in a paragraph or lines in a poem.
• Fallacy: An error in reasoning that renders an argument invalid.
• False Dilemma: A fallacy of oversimplification that offers a limited number of options (usually two) when, in fact, more options are available.
• Figurative Language: Language in which figures of speech (such as metaphors, similes, and hyperbole) freely occur.
• Figures of Speech: The various uses of language that depart from customary construction, order, or significance.
• Flashback: A shift in a narrative to an earlier event that interrupts the normal chronological development of a story.
• Genre: A category of artistic composition, as in film or literature, marked by a distinctive style, form, or content.
• Hasty Generalization: A fallacy in which a conclusion is not logically justified by sufficient or unbiased evidence.
• Hyperbole: A figure of speech in which exaggeration is used for emphasis or effect; an extravagant statement.
• Imagery: Vivid descriptive language that appeals to one or more of the senses.
• Induction: A method of reasoning by which a rhetor collects a number of instances and forms a generalization that is meant to apply to all instances.
• Invective: Denunciatory or abusive language; discourse that casts blame on somebody or something.
• Irony: The use of words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning. A statement or situation where the meaning is directly contradicted by the appearance or presentation of the idea.
• Isocolon: A succession of phrases of approximately equal length and corresponding structure.
• Jargon: The specialized language of a professional, occupational, or other group, often meaningless to outsiders.
• Litotes: A figure of speech consisting of an understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by negating its opposite.
• Loose Sentence: A sentence structure in which a main clause is followed by subordinate phrases and clauses. Contrast with periodic sentence.
• Metaphor: A figure of speech in which an implied comparison is made between two unlike things that actually have something important in common.
• Metonymy: A figure of speech in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated (such as "crown" for "royalty").
• Mode of Discourse: The way in which information is presented in a text. The four traditional modes are narration, description, exposition, and argument.
• Mood: (1) The quality of a verb that conveys the writer's attitude toward a subject. (2) The emotion evoked by a text.
• Narrative: A rhetorical strategy that recounts a sequence of events, usually in chronological order.
• Noun: The part of speech (or word class) that is used to name a person, place, thing, quality, or action.
• Onomatopoeia: The formation or use of words that imitate the sounds associated with the objects or actions they refer to.
• Oxymoron: A figure of speech in which incongruous or contradictory terms appear side by side.
• Paradox: A statement that appears to contradict itself.
• Parallelism: The similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses.
• Parody: A literary or artistic work that imitates the characteristic style of an author or a work for comic effect or ridicule.
• Pathos: The means of persuasion that appeals to the audience's emotions.
• Periodic Sentence: A long and frequently involved sentence, marked by suspended syntax, in which the sense is not completed until the final word--usually with an emphatic climax.
• Personification: A figure of speech in which an inanimate object or abstraction is endowed with human qualities or abilities.
• Point of View: The perspective from which a speaker or writer tells a story or presents information.
• Predicate: One of the two main parts of a sentence or clause, modifying the subject and including the verb, objects, or phrases governed by the verb.
• Pronoun: A word (a part of speech or word class) that takes the place of a noun.
• Prose: Ordinary writing (both fiction and nonfiction) as distinguished from verse.
• Refutation: The part of an argument wherein a speaker or writer anticipates and counters opposing points of view.
• Repetition: An instance of using a word, phrase, or clause more than once in a short passage--dwelling on a point.
• Rhetoric: The study and practice of effective communication.
• Rhetorical Question: A question asked merely for effect with no answer expected.
• Running Style: Sentence style that appears to follow the mind as it worries a problem through, mimicking the "rambling, associative syntax of conversation"—the opposite of periodic sentence style.
• Sarcasm: A mocking, often ironic or satirical remark.
• Satire: A text or performance that uses irony, derision, or wit to expose or attack human vice, foolishness, or stupidity.
• Simile: A figure of speech in which two fundamentally unlike things are explicitly compared, usually in a phrase introduced by "like" or "as"
• Style: Narrowly interpreted as those figures that ornament speech or writing; broadly, as representing a manifestation of the person speaking or writing.
• Subject: The part of a sentence or clause that indicates what it is about.
• Syllogism: A form of deductive reasoning consisting of a major premise, a minor premise, and a conclusion.
• Subordination: Words, phrases, and clauses that make one element of a sentence dependent on (or subordinate to) another. Contrast with coordination.
• Symbol: A person, place, action, or thing that (by association, resemblance, or convention) represents something other than itself.
• Synecdoche: A figure of speech in which a part is used to represent the whole or the whole for a part.
• Syntax: (1) The study of the rules that govern the way words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences. (2) The arrangement of words in a sentence.
• Thesis: The main idea of an essay or report, often written as a single declarative sentence.
• Tone: A writer's attitude toward the subject and audience. Tone is primarily conveyed through diction, point of view, syntax, and level of formality.
• Transition: The connection between two parts of a piece of writing, contributing to coherence.
• Understatement: A figure of speech in which a writer deliberately makes a situation seem less important or serious than it is.
• Verb: The part of speech (or word class) that describes an action or occurrence or indicates a state of being.
• Voice: (1) The quality of a verb that indicates whether its subject acts (active voice) or is acted upon (passive voice). (2) The distinctive style or manner of expression of an author or narrator.
• Zeugma: The use of a word to modify or govern two or more words, although its use may be grammatically or logically correct with only one.