Medenilla, Gabriel P.

LIT02 Activity

4BIT January 23, 2018

1. Define figures of speech.

- It is a phrase or word having different meanings than its literal meanings.
- It conveys meaning by identifying or comparing one thing to another, which has connotation
or meaning familiar to the audience.
2. Define each one and give 2 examples each.

1) Simile – It is a figure of speech that makes a comparison, showing similarities between

two different things. Unlike a metaphor, a simile draws resemblance with the help of the
words “like” or “as.” Therefore, it is a direct comparison.

Examples:

a. Her cheeks are red like a rose.

b. He is as funny as a monkey.

2) Metaphor - It is a figure of speech containing an implied comparison, in which a word or

phrase ordinarily and primarily used of one thing is applied to another.

Examples:

a. He drowned in a sea of grief.

b. Success is a bastard as it has many fathers, and failure is an orphan, with no
takers.

3) Personification – It is a figure of speech in which a thing – an idea or an animal – is given

human attributes. The non-human objects are portrayed in such a way that we feel they
can act like human beings.

Examples:

a. The wind whispered through dry grass.

b. Time and tide wait for none.

4) Metonymy - It is a figure of speech that replaces the name of a thing with the name of
something else with which it is closely associated.

Examples:

a. England decides to keep check on immigration. (England refers to the

government.)
b. Let me give you a hand. (Hand means help.)
 5) Hyperbole – It is derived from a Greek word meaning “over-casting,” is a figure of speech
that involves an exaggeration of ideas for the sake of emphasis.

Examples:

a. Your suitcase weighs a ton!

b. I am trying to solve a million issues these days.

6) Irony – It is a figure of speech in which words are used in such a way that their intended
meaning is different from the actual meaning of the words. It may also be a situation that
ends up in quite a different way than what is generally anticipated. In simple words, it is
a difference between appearance and reality.

Examples:

a. I posted a video on YouTube about how boring and useless YouTube is.
b. The butter is as soft as a slab of marble.

7) Oxymoron – It s a figure of speech in which two opposite ideas are joined to create an
effect. The common oxymoron phrase is a combination of an adjective proceeded by a
noun with contrasting meanings, such as “cruel kindness,” or “living death”. However, the
contrasting words/phrases are not always glued together. The contrasting ideas may be
spaced out in a sentence, such as, “In order to lead, you must walk behind.”

Examples:

a. Tragic comedy.
b. Seriously funny.

8) Apostrophe – It is a term used when a speaker directly addresses someone or something

that isn't present in the poem. The speaker could be addressing an abstract concept like
love, a person (dead or alive), a place, or even a thing, like the sun or the sea.

Examples:

a. “Oh Captain! my Captain! Our fearful trip is done.” –Walt Whitman

b. “But tell me, Death, when will you show your face at my door?” –Unknown

3. Sound devices – define and give 2 examples each.

1) Accent - The rhythmically significant stress in the articulation of words, giving some
syllables more relative prominence than others. In words of two or more syllables, one
syllable is almost invariably stressed more strongly than the other syllables. Words of one
syllable may be either stressed or unstressed, depending on the context in which they are
used, but connective one-syllable words like, and, but, or, to, etc., are generally
unstressed. The words in a line of poetry are usually arranged so the accents occur at
regular intervals, with the meter defined by the placement of the accents within the foot.
Accent should not be construed as emphasis.
 Examples:

a. Sidelight: Two degrees of accent are natural to many multisyllabic English words,
designated as primary and secondary.
b. Sidelight: When a syllable is accented, it tends to be raised in pitch and
lengthened. Any or a combination of stress/pitch/length can be a metrical accent.
c. Sidelight: When the full accent falls on a vowel, as in PO-tion, that vowel is called
a long vowel; when it falls on an articulation or consonant, as in POR-tion, the
preceding vowel is a short vowel.

2) Alliteration – It is derived from Latin’s “Latira”. It means “letters of alphabet”. It is a

stylistic device in which a number of words, having the same first consonant sound, occur
close together in a series.

Examples:

a. Dunkin’ Donuts
b. PayPal

3) Assonance – It takes place when two or more words, close to one another repeat the
same vowel sound, but start with different consonant sounds.

Examples:

a. Go and mow the lawn.

b. Johnny went here and there and everywhere

4) Consonance – It refers to repetitive sounds produced by consonants within a sentence or

phrase. This repetition often takes place in quick succession, such as in “pitter, patter.” It
is classified as a literary device used in both poetry as well as prose.

Examples:

a. She ate seven sandwiches on a sunny Sunday last year.

b. Shelley sells shells by the seashore.

5) Rhyme – It is a repetition of similar sounding words, occurring at the end of lines in poems
or songs. A rhyme is a tool utilizing repeating patterns that bring rhythm or musicality to
poems.

Examples:

a. “Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?

Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full!
One for the master, one for the dame,
And one for the little boy who lives down the lane.”
b. “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
 All the King’s horses, And all the King’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again!”

6) Meter – It is a stressed and unstressed syllabic pattern in a verse, or within the lines of a
poem. Stressed syllables tend to be longer, and unstressed shorter. In simple language,
meter is a poetic device that serves as a linguistic sound pattern for the verses, as it gives
poetry a rhythmical and melodious sound.

Examples:

a. Don’t search faults. Find remedies. (Iambic meter)

b. Be happy, be positive, be you. (Spondaic meter)

7) Modulation – change in stress, pitch, loudness, or tone of the voice; an inflection of the
voice. b. An instance of such a change or an inflection. The harmonious use of language,
as in poetry or prose.

Examples:

a. Reading loudly on a part that needs the reader to be loud and strong.
b. Saying the lines in a play that acts like a little creature.

8) Onomatopoeia – It is defined as a word, which imitates the natural sounds of a thing. It

creates a sound effect that mimics the thing described, making the description more
expressive and interesting.

Examples:

a. The books fell on the table with a loud thump.

b. The buzzing bee flew away.