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Form and Structure of Words


ABNADIPLOSIS- the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning and end of a sentence.

ADJECTIVES - descriptive words that add detail to a sentence. They can give important or necessary information

ADNOUN - the use of an adjective as a noun. Blessed are the merciful. See also: adnominal.

ANTANACLASIS - repetition of a word whose meaning changes in the second instance. "Your argument is sound...all sound." -- Benjamin Franklin.

APPOSITION - the juxtaposition of two nouns, the second of which clarifies the first. "The man, a leather-clad hoodlum, bolted from the scene when the police showed up."

ASYNDETON - lack of conjunctions between coordinate words, phrases, or clauses; a form of brachylogy.

CAESURA - a break within words in a line.

CHIASMUS - a figure of speech containing two phrases that are parallel but inverted to each other.

CONJUNCTIONS - words like and, but, and or that connect concepts, clauses, or parts of sentences.

CRASIS - a contraction of two vowels, usually the final and initial vowels of consecutive words, into one long vowel or diphthong.

DETERMINER - a word that introduces a noun, (a/an, the, every, this, those, or many). For example a car, the car, this car, many cars.

ENJAMBMENT - a thought that runs from one line to the next without a syntactical break.

ENALLAGE - substitution of one part of speech, gender, number case, person, tense, mode, or voice for another. The royal "we," as a substitute for "I."

ENCLITIC - a word or syllable which is joined with the preceding word in such a way as to lose its own independent accent. "Prithee," which is a shortening of "pray thee," and "'em," in, "Get 'em!".

EPISTROPHE - the repetition of words or phrases at the end.

EPIZEUXIS - repetition of a word with vehemence or emphasis. "Alone, alone, all all alone. Alone on a wide wide sea." -- Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

EXCLAMATION (also called an interjection) - a word or phrase that expresses strong emotion, such as surprise, pleasure, or anger.

EXTRAPOSITION - placement of a subject at a later position in the sentence than where it would normally be. "To sit down," in, "It is nice to sit down," which would normally be phrased, "To sit down is nice."

GREEK PREFIX - usually adverbs that can't be used alone in English and appear at the beginnings of words.

ANA (up, back again, throughout, against)
  • Anagram, anabolic
ANTI (against)
  • Antibiotics, antithesis
APO (by away from)
  • Apolitical
CATA (down, across, under)
  • Catapult, catastrophe
DI (two, twice, double)
  • Divide, directional
DIA (through)
  • Diagram, diagnosis
DYS (hard, difficult, bad)
  • Dysfunctional, dysentery
EC- EX (out of)
  • Explanation, expire
ECTO (outside)
  • Ectoplasm
EXO (outside, outward)
  • Exoskeleton, exodus
EN (in)
  • Engage, entice
EU (well, good, easy)
  • Euphoria
HEMI (half)
  • Hemisphere
HYPER (over, above)
  • Hyperactive, hypersensitive
HYPO (below, under)
  • Hypotension
META (with, after, beyond)
  • Metaphorical, metadata
OPISTHO (behind)
  • Opisthotonos
PALIN (again)
  • Palindrome
PARA (along side of, beside)
  • Parachute, paramedic
PERI (around, near)
  • Periscope, period
POST (after, behind)
  • Postdoctoral, postdated
PRE (in front of, before)
  • Premeditate, prepare
PRO (before, in front of)
  • Proclamation, promise
PROSO (onwards, in front)
  • Prosody
SYN (with)
  • Synonym, synonymous

HYPERBATON - a manipulation of the regular positioning of words and phrases that creates a differently structured sentence to convey the same meaning.

INTERJECTIONS - words like wow and yay. They’re sounds we make to convey extreme emotion or to create emphasis when we’re talking, sometimes when we can’t think of a good way to express ourselves. The problem with interjections is that they require a great deal of context to be understood.
  • For instance, hey can mean hello, or that’s great, or stop doing that. Hey! How’s it going? Wow! Those fireworks are impressive. Yay! I passed the test!

INTERROBANG - punctuation mark that combines a question mark and exclamation point indicating a mixture of query and interjection.

INVERSION - when a writer changes the conventional placement of words

ISOCOLON - when a writer creates parallel structures in length and rhythm.

JUXTAPOSITION - when a writer places a person, concept, place, idea or theme parallel to another.

KENNINGS - when a writer twists the words, figure of speech or phrase to refer to a person, object, place, action or idea.

LATIN PREFIX - usually adverbs that can't be used alone in English and appear at the beginnings of words.

AB (away from)
  • abandonment, abdicate, abduct
AD (to, towards, near)
  • adaption, addition, addendum
AMBI (both)
  • ambidextrous, ambiguity
ANTE (before, in front of)
  • antebellum, antecedent
BI-/BIS (twice, double)
  • bicentennial, bidirectional
CIRCUM (around)
  • circumference, circumstantial
CON (with)
  • Conspire, concatenate
CONTRA (against)
  • Contraband, contradict
DE (down, from, away fro)
  • Delinquent, detached
DIS (apart, removed)
  • Disengage, disappear
ENDO (within)
  • Endorsement, endowment, endocrine
EPI (on, upon)
  • Episode, epidemic
EXTRA (outside, beyond, in addition to)
  • Extraneous, extravaganza
IN (not occasionally, beyond belief)
  • Inactive, inadvertent
INFRA (below)
  • Infrastructure, infrared
INTER (between)
  • Intercommunication, interdepartmental
INTRO (within)
  • Introduce, introspective
INTUS (within)
  • Intussuscept
NON (not)
  • Nonjudgmental, nondairy
PER (through, thorough, complete)
  • Perfect, performance
RE (back, again)
  • Retrace, re-examine
RETRO (backward)
  • Retrograde, retroactive
SEMI (half)
  • Semigloss, semiannual
SUB (under, below)
  • Subjugate, subordinate
SUPER (supra - above, upper)
  • Superior, superlative
TRANS (across)
  • Transfer, transaction
ULTRA (beyond)
  • Ultrasound, ultragrade

METONYMY - substitution of a word or phrase with another which it suggests. "The pen is mightier than the sword," in which both "pen" and "sword" are substituted for "written prose" and "military."

MONEPIC - comprising of one word, or of single word sentences.

NOUNS - refer to people, places, or things. Even intangible or abstract concepts like ideas or thoughts are things.
  • The house, England, my mother, the phone

PERICOPE - a selection or extract from a book.

PHONEME - the smallest phonetic unit in a language that is capable of conveying a distinction in meaning. "M", in "man," and "c", in "can," are phonemes.

PILCROW- a paragraph mark

POLYPTOTON - the repetition of the root word.

POLYSYNDETON - uses conjunctions or connecting words frequently in a sentence and are placed very close to one another.

PREPOSITIONS - little words that tell where or when (among other things) something is.
  • The cat is on his back. The glue is behind the board. The poster is above the bed.

PROCLITIC - a word or syllable which is joined with the following word in such a way as to lose its own independent accent. "Prithee," which is a shortening of "pray thee," and "Get," in, "Get 'em!"

PROCATALEPSIS - anticipating and answering an opponent's objections in advance; an instance of prolepsis.

PRONOUNS - words that replace nouns. I, me, she, we, they, who, that, yours, his, her, etc.
  • Pronouns need antecedents. That means that the thing (or person, or place) that the pronoun refers to needs to have been mentioned already by name somewhere earlier in the sentence or paragraph. If it’s not clear which thing the pronoun refers to, the reader can get quite confused.

PRONOUN ANTECEDENT AGREEMENT - When a pronoun replaces a noun, the noun is called an antecedent.
  • On Michael’s first day of work, he was a little nervous. Michael is the antecedent and he is the pronoun.
  • The antecedent doesn’t have to go before the pronoun, but in longer sentences it can be confusing to introduce the pronoun before the antecedent.
    • On his first day of work, Michael was a little nervous.

PROSTHESIS - the prefixing of one or more letters to the beginning of a word. "Beloved."

SUBJECT VERB AGREEMENT - singular subjects take singular verbs and plural subjects take plural verbs.

SUBJECTIVE MOOD- subjunctive is a form verbs can take to express conditions that are hypothetical or not true. It’s not a verb tense.
  • The subjunctive form usually uses the third-person form of the verb with the ‑s dropped. When using the verb “to be” in the subjunctive, the present tense is be and the past tense is were.
  • The subjunctive is used with certain expressions that imply a good or bad quality or an imperative. Often, the subjunctive verb is preceded by the word that in the phrases
    • it is best that and it is essential that
  • The subjunctive mood can express conditions that are not true:
    • If I were queen for a day, I would eat cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
  • It can express hypothetical situations:
If I were to design a dresser, it would be made of teak.
  • It can be used to express wishes:
    • I wish I were able to go on vacation with you.
  • It can express commands or demands:
    • The boss demanded that he complete the project or be fired.
  • It can express suggestions:
    • I suggest that she cut back on refined sugar to improve her health.

SYSTOLE - the shortening of a long syllable.

TAUTOLOGY - when you repeat an idea that has already been stated with another word or phrase.

VERBS - action words: that’s a rather simplified explanation, but it’s the clearest one. Verbs tell you what the subject of the sentence is up to.
  • He ran into the wall. She buys new shoes. The cat licks its fur.

VERB TENSES - verbs come in past, present, and future tenses.
  • PAST: The past is used to describe things that have already happened
    • earlier in the day, yesterday, last week, three years ago
  • PRESENT: The present tense is used to describe things that are happening right now, or things that are continuous.
  • FUTURE: The future tense describes things that have yet to happen
    • later, tomorrow, next week, next year, three years from now

WORDS - the smallest elements that can be used in insulation with objective and practical meaning. Words are thought of as the smallest meaningful unit of speech that can stand by themselves.

WORD CLASSES - the parts of speech. These include nouns, determiners, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions.

WORD ROOTS - words that do not have a prefix in front of the word or a suffix at the end of the word. The root word is the primary unit of a word and of a word family. It carries the semantic content and can’t be reduced.

ZEUGMA - two words linked to another, which only applies to one of them; also, a syllepsis. See also: syllepsis.​

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