Examples of Rhetorical Tropes

Blogged about Rhetorical Figures earlier this week and got my assignment back with input from the instructor. So I can share my examples without feeling embarrassed as he confirmed I’m not too bad at it 🙂

Anaphora: I used to be one of those women who wanted to climb the ladder. I used to be one of those women who got involved with professional organizations. I used to be one of those women who wanted an MBA. All that changed after kid number two arrived. I simply couldn’t do it all. Some can, but not me.

Antimetabole: No matter the outcome of the game, teams with good sportsmanship are winners who never lose while those with poor sportsmanship are losers who never win.

Enthymeme: The student disobeyed the school’s strict plagiarism policy, so she is no longer a student at this university.
Note: This was a toughie.

Epistrophe: A candidate in the mayoral race played dirty. A candidate in the school board trustee race played dirty. Both candidates lost.

Note from the instructor: Interesting that this combines epistrophe with enthymeme (sort-of).

Parallelism: “Some complain that eBay does not do enough to vet its members, does not offer enough in terms of protection policies and does not keep repeat infringers off of its site.” A quoted source in a story I wrote that I edited to give it parallelism.

Scesis onomaton: The news story on online predators scared, horrified, and shocked many parents.

Symploce: Born profoundly deaf, my parents chose to raise me orally rather than learn sign language. Yet, the deaf world, I don’t belong. Yet, the hearing world, I don’t belong. I’m stuck in between where so few belong.