GHSGT/EOCT Terms

1. GHSGT/EOCTTerms American Lit

2. Table Of Contents • Literary Terms • Structure • Figurative Language • Forms Of Poetry • Sound Devices In Poetry • Periods Of American Literature

3. Literary Terms. • Flashback; A literary work that interrupts the chronoloqical presentation of events to relate to an event from an earlier time. • Example: - In the movie The Blind Side, they referred back to when the main character was a young man. This helped explain why his life was in the predicament that it was in at the time. • 2. Foreshadowing; the use of clues to suggest events that have yet to occur. • Example: • In the book Cask Of The Amontillado one of the characters in the book planned to kill another character, and earlier in the story, the character made a statement that foreshadowed him planning to kill the other character.

4. 3. Mood; the feeling created in the reader by a literary work or passage. • Example; In the movie Titanic, many people died. The movie gave off a sad mood. 4. Tone; the writer’s attitude toward his/her subject, characters or audience. • Example; In a play I seen at a church function, teens were acting out the truth about Hell. The narrator’s voice was loud and filled with fear. 5. Imagery; creates words pictures for the reader by appealing to the senses. • Example; some authors write books to make you picture what they are saying in your head. This is called imagery.

5. 6. Point Of View; the perspective, or vantage point, from which a story is told. • Example; Amarah is a very determined student. This would begin a story to be told in someone else’s point of view other than my own. First Person - narrator is a character in the story and refers to him/herself with the pronoun “I”. Omniscient Third Person - narrator knows and tells about what each character feels and thinks. Limited Third Person – narrator relaters the inner thoughts and feelings of only one character, and everything is viewed from this character’s perspective. 7. Paradox; a lit term for a seemingly contradictory statement that may nonetheless be true. • Example;When we live no more, we will live ever. –Anne Bradstreet

6. 8. Allusion; a reference to a well-known person, place, event lit work, or work of art. The bible, Shakespeare, etc. are often alluded in various literature, movies, etc. • Example; Harriet Tubman was called the Moses of her time 9. Theme; a central message or insight into life revealed by a lit work. • Example; Anyway, the theme of Charlotte's Web is that a pig shall be saved. 10. Protagonist; the main character in a literary work. • Example; In the movie Robin Hood, the fox, Robin Hood, was the protagonist of the story. 11. Antagonist; a character or force in conflict with a main character, or protagonist. • Example; In the movie Lion King, the King’s brother and the hyenas were the antagonists of the story.

7. 12. Climax; the high point of interest or suspense in a lit work. • Example; Our everyday lives tell a story, when people go through storms, they reach climaxes in their lives. 13. Apostrophe; a figure of speech in which a speaker directly addresses an absent person or a personified quality, object or idea. • Example; The Sun Rising by John Donne • Busy old fool, unruly sun,Why dost thou thus,Through windows, and through curtains call on us? 14. Conflict; a struggle or clash between opposing forces. • Example; In the tale Cinderella, Cinderella and her “step” family did not get along. This is an example of conflict.

8. 17. Irony; an outcome of events contrary to what was, or might have been, expected. - Situational Irony: an outcome that turns out to be very different from what was expected, the difference between what is expected to happen and what actually does. - Verbal Irony: a figure of speech in which what is said is the opposite of what is meant . 15. Dialogue; conversation between two or more people. 16. Diction: the choice and use of words in writing or speech.

9. Structure • In Medias Res- a Latin term meaning in the middle of things. The story begins with action. • Chronological-arranged in order of occurrence. • Frame Narrative- A story told within a story. For example, Forrest Gump • Epistolary- constructed in the form of a series of letters, journals, diaries, etc. • (The Color Purple, The Notebook, The Diary of Ann Frank)

10. Figurative Language • Personification; giving something nonhuman, human characteristics. • Example; The trees are swaying with the wind. • Symbolism; the representation of something in symbolic form. • Example; The color purple is symbolic for royalty. • Simile; two unlike things are explicitly compared using like or as. • Example; Her shoes are as white as snow. • Metaphor; the comparison of one thing to another without the use of like  or as. • Example; This tree is bigger than that one.

11. Extended Metaphor; a metaphor that is extended through a stanza or entire poem, often by multiple comparisons of unlike objects or ideas. • Hyperbole; a deliberate exaggeration used for effect • Example; He embraced her into his arms a thousand times. • Synecdoche; a figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole or the whole for a part • Example; An army for a soldier. • Metonymy; a figure of speech that consists of the use of the name of one object or concept for that of another to which it is related, or of which it is a part.

12. Oxymoron; contradictory terms are used in conjunction • Example; “She is just a poor little rich girl.” • Onomatopoeia; the formation of words whose sound is imitative of the sound of the noise or action designated. • Example; Peter Pieper picked a pack of pickled peppers.

13. Forms Of Poetry • Free Verse; unrhymed verse without a metrical pattern. • Lyric Poetry;a type of emotional songlike poetry, distinguished from dramatic and narrative poetry • Ballad; a narrative poem in short stanzas of popular origin, originally sung to a repeated tune • Sonnet;a poem, properly expressive of a single, complete thought, idea, or sentiment, of 14 lines. • Quatrain; a stanza or poem of four lines, usually with alternate rhymes. • Refrain; a phrase or verse recurring at intervals in a song or poem

14. Sound Devices In Poetry. • Alliteration-the repetition of the initial sound . • Example Peter Piper picked a pickled pepper. • End Rhyme; in poetry, a rhyme that occurs in the end of a line of poetry. • Internal Rhyme- rhyming within a line of poetry. • Slant Rhyme; rhyme in which either the vowels or the consonants of stressed syllables are identical. • Example: eyes, light; years, yours.

15. Consonance-repetition of consonants sound not necessarily in the beginning of lines. • Assonance- repetition of vowels or vowel sounds in a line of poetry, not necessarily in the beginning o f lines. • Example: Dime, Lime, Mime.

16. Periods Of American Lit. • Colonial Period; Focuses on historical events, daily life, moral attitudes, (Puritanism] political unrest. • Romanticism Period; Celebrates individualism, nature, imagination, emotions. • Harlem Renaissance; a cultural movement in 1920s America during which black art, literature, and music experienced renewal and growth, originating in New York City's Harlem district;