Essay ( Song anayasis )

Discourse Terms:

Text: The actual message being analyzed. Lyrics, the music, possibly a video

Context: Who, what, when, where, why, how, ???

Subtext: The actual message being conveyed

Intertextuality: References to other texts

A couple is on a road trip. They have been driving several hours. The wife asks her husband, “Do you want to stop for dinner soon?” He says, “Nah” and keeps driving. She gets angry.

Text: “Do you want to stop for dinner soon?” “Nah.”

Context: Road trip, married heterosexual couple, been in the car a long time

Subtext: I want to stop for dinner, you jerk!

Intertextuality: Every time we go on a road trip, you become a jerk who forgets about my needs!

Speech Acts: Sometimes uttering words accomplishes something beyond the actual words. Think of promises, wedding vows, threats, blessing, testifying under oath. Sometimes they have restrictions of who can use them or in which circumstances.

I promise to clean the house before you get home.

Kayla said she’s going to kick his butt in the parking lot after class.

I do.

Rhetorical Terms:

Aristotle’s rhetorical triangle: All three components of the triangle are always present, but we emphasize the one(s) most appropriate for our topic and audience.

Ethos: ethics. Associated with the author, establishing credibility

Pathos: empathize, sympathize, pathetic. Associated with the audience, connecting to them emotionally.

Logos: log, blog, logic. The text itself, but remember that text is not necessarily just words, but also instruments, musical production, possibly a video, etc.

Kairos: Time and place. Not formally part of the triangle, but also an Aristotelian concept. Connects closely to the discourse concept Context.

Exigence: Rhetoric-ese for urgency, a need for immediate action

Poetic Terms:

End rhyme

Internal rhyme

Slant rhyme/near rhyme

Alliteration: Repetition of consonant sounds

Assonance: Repetition of vowel sounds

Rhythm:

Meter:

Flow:

Speed:

Iambic: Every other beat is stressed

Imagery: Using words to create a picture

Metaphor: Discussing one thing in terms of another thing.

Simile: A metaphor that uses ‘like’ or ‘as’

Allusion: very similar to intertextuality