C-WE #7. Favorite Rhetorical Techniques

Written February 12, 2012

From my own head, uploaded way late and overedited:
A list of my favorite 7 (or so) rhetorical techniques

1. Paraprosdokian: setting up an "obvious," often clichéd, phrase or situation, then adding an unexpected surprise twist. E.g. Groucho Marx's "I once shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know."
2. Irony: My provisional version of the (often misunderstood) definition of irony is an unexpected reversal between expectation and reality. The Wikipedia article I referenced to check says that in an ironic situation "actions taken have an effect exactly opposite from what was intended." E.g. (again stealing shamelessly from Wikipedia) "being shot by one's own gun."
• That was situational irony, irony in events; irony can also be used for rhetorical effect. In that context, irony involves consistently and intentionally asserting the opposite of one's true beliefs.
• Related are sarcasm (irony's ignoble cousin) as well as satire:  commentary on the human condition, usually filled to bursting with deadpan ironic delivery; exemplified by Swift's Modest Proposal.
3. Litotes: intentional understatement. Works well with irony; very enjoyable to use; shades into euphemism if employed only to deceive or spin.
4. Parallel structure: many subspecies; among them chiasmus (a-b-b-a format); anadiplosis (starting a phrase with the word(s) used to end the previous one; anaphora (starting several phrases with the same word/phrase); and epistrophe (ending several phrases with the same word/phrase). Repetition, especially when it involves twisting the sentence structure just enough but not too much, is an excellent attention grabber.
5. Hypallage: another one of the techniques (with apostrophe and paraprosdokian) I presented on in AP Lang & Comp; really cool, when you know it's there. It's the transfer of adjectives from the usual subject to a more unlikely (or convenient) one; examples include "drunk driving" (the driving isn't drunk, the driver is, but "a drunk driver driving" is cumbersome) and "the winged sound of whirling" (from Classical Greek; replaces "the sound of whirling wings"!).
6. Asyndeton: a very popular device; leaving out the "and" in a list. This creates an unusual but powerful effect by removing the emphasis on the last element. Rather than saying "something weird, wild, and wonderful," put all qualities on equal footing by saying "something weird, wild, wonderful." Ah! What a difference.
7. Polysyndeton: Asyndeton's evil twin brother. Rather than taking the "and" out of the list, add "and" between every element. Produces a sensation of relentless and unceasing flow: "He ran and jumped and shouted and laughed and cried and ate and slept."