Resources of Language:Syntax

Felix Garcia and Ruben Toirac

Active Voice

• In a sentence using active voice, the subject of the sentence performs the action expressed by the verb.

• Ex.–The child kicked the ball.

–Sally mailed the letter.

–They have conducted the experiments.

Passive Voice

• In a sentence using passive voice, the subject is being acted upon by the verb.

• Ex.–The ball was kicked by the child.

–The class was taught by the professor.

–Her purse was stolen.

Repetition

• The duplication, either exact or approximate, of a word, phrase, clause, sentence, or grammatical pattern.

• Ex.– I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody too?Then there's a pair of

us-don't tell!They'd banish us you

know.– "Words, words, words."

(Hamlet)

Anaphora• Repetition of the same word or

group of words at the beginning of successive clauses

• Ex.– We shall fight on the beaches, we

shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills…” Churchill

– And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity,

And purest faith unhappily forsworn, And gilded honour shamefully misplac'd,

And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,

Epistrophe• Ending a series of lines, phrases,

clauses, or sentences with the same word or words.

• Ex.– What lies behind us and what

lies before us are tiny compared to what lies within us." —Emerson

– Hourly joys be still upon you! Juno sings her blessings

on you. [. . .] Scarcity and want shall

shun you, Ceres' blessing so is on

you. — Shakespeare, The

Tempest (4.1.108-109; 116-17)

Inversion

• Figure of speech in which a language's usual word order is inverted

• Ex.o Sure I am of this, that you have only to endure to

conquer. (Winston Churchillo Gracious she was. By gracious I mean full of graceso In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure dome decree

Anastrophe

• A rhetorical term for the inversion of the normal order of the parts of a sentence.

• Ex.– "Told you, I did. Reckless is

he. Now matters are worse."– After great pain a formal

feeling comes –

The nerves sit ceremonious like tombs.Emily Dickinson

Chiasmus• Grammatical structure in which the

first clause or phrase is reversed in the second, sometimes repeating the same words.

• Ex.– “And so, my fellow Americans, ask

not what your country can do for you: ask what you can

do for your country.” John F. Kennedy

– It's not the men in my lifeit's the life in my men.

– By day the frolic, and the dance by night

Asyndeton

• Deliberate omission of conjunctions between a series of related clauses

• Ex.– I came, I saw, I

conquered.– "He was a bag of bones,

a floppy doll, a broken stick, a maniac."(Jack Kerouac, On the Road, 1957)

Polysyndeton• Deliberate use of many

conjunctions; opposite of asyndeton

• Ex.–The meal was huge – my mother fixed okra and green beans and ham and apple pie and salad and all manner of fine country food – but no matter how I tried, I could not consume it to her satisfaction.–“And each dark tree that ever grew,Is curtained out from Heaven’s wide blue;Nor sun, nor moon, nor wind, nor rain,Can pierce its interwoven bowers…”

Meter

•Basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse

•Described with feet (monometer, dimeter, trimeter, etc.)

Enjambment•The continuation of the sense and

therefore the grammatical construction beyond the end of a line of verse or the end of a couplet

•Ex.–i carry your heart with me (i carry it

inmy heart) i am never without it (anywherei go you go, my dear; and whatever is doneby only me is your doing, my darling

–I am not prone to weeping, as our sexCommonly are; the want of which vain dewPerchance shall dry your pities; but I haveThat honourable grief lodged here which burnsWorse than tears drown.

Caesura

•A rhythmic break or pause in the flow of sound which is commonly introduced in about the middle of a line of verse

•Ex.–"Sing, o goddess, the rage ||

of Achilles, the son of Peleus."–Know then thyself II,

presume not God to scan;• The proper study of

Mankind II is Man.•Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state,A being darkly wise, and rudely great:

Listing• Writing a series of words or

phrases together, one after the other and in a sentence, as if it were a list

• Ex.– Apples, pears, and bananas– POLONIUS

The best actors in the world, either for tragedy,

comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical,

historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-

comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or

poem unlimited

Loose Sentence

• A type of sentence in which the main idea (independent clause) comes first, followed by dependent grammatical units such as phrases and clauses

• Ex.–I found a large hall,

obviously a former garage, dimly lit, and packed with cots.

–The wildcat looked briefly at the two humans, seemed to sneer with a raised lip, and stalked off back into the woods.