Monthly Archives: July 2012

Traductio

Posted on July 29, 2012 | Leave a comment

Traductio (tra-duk’-ti-o): Repeating the same word variously throughout a sentence or thought. Some authorities restrict traductio further to mean repeating the same word but with a different meaning (see ploce, antanaclasis, and diaphora), or in a different form (=polyptoton. . . . ). If the repeated word occurs in parallel fashion at the beginnings of phrases or clauses, it becomes anaphora; at the endings of phrases or clauses, epistrophe.

Hope for rain and hope will reign even if it doesn’t rain!

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Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

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Ominatio

Posted on July 28, 2012 | Leave a comment

Ominatio (o-mi-na’-ti-o): A prophecy of evil.

When the party who is to blame places the blame on those who are blameless;

When the party who is to blame willingly fails to cooperate to remedy the harm they themselves have caused;

When the party who is to blame wantonly induces and perpetuates the peoples’ painful suffering, ironically, for partisan political gain;

Then, they thwart the Peoples’ Pursuit of Happiness and dishonor Liberty’s name.

Surely, when the party who is to blame will rise to great power, it shall come to pass that the Republic’s wounds will fester and will not heal;

Surely, when the party who is to blame will rise to great power, the world will recoil in horror–shocked and awed–by the party’s psychotic pursuit of The End of Time as the preordained purpose of its reign.

Beware the Day of Election!

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Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

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Symploce

Posted on July 3, 2012 | Leave a comment

Symploce (sim’-plo-see or sim’-plo-kee): The combination of anaphora and epistrophe: beginning a series of lines, clauses, or sentences with the same word or phrase while simultaneously repeating a different word or phrase at the end of each element in this series.

Without some degree of certainty about healthcare reform, it is difficult for businesses and investors to plan for the future.

Without some degree of certainty about healthcare reform, it is difficult for parents and their children to plan for the future.

Without some degree of certainty about healthcare reform, it is difficult for working people and retirees to plan for the future; and, for people with preexisting conditions, even after the Supreme Court’s ruling, it is nearly immoral to force them to sweat out the summer in fear, at the edge of catastrophe, not knowing whether they will be insured after November’s election.

Stop beating your Republican chest and boasting that you will repeal the Affordable Care Act (or what you call “Obamacare”) when you’re elected.

Your cruelty is unbearable.

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Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)

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