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Spoonerism. An example of spoonerism on a protest placard in London, England: "Buck Frexit" instead of "Fuck Brexit ". A spoonerism is an occurrence of speech in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched (see metathesis) between two words of a phrase. [ 1][ a] These are named after the Oxford don and priest William ...
Lodgings to Let, an 1814 engraving featuring a double entendre. He: "My sweet honey, I hope you are to be let with the Lodgins!" She: "No, sir, I am to be let alone".. A double entendre [note 1] (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, one of which is typically obvious, and the other often conveys a message that ...
a. a city named Buffalo. This is used as a noun adjunct in the sentence; n. the noun buffalo, an animal, in the plural (equivalent to "buffaloes" or "buffalos"), in order to avoid articles. v. the verb "buffalo" meaning to outwit, confuse, deceive, intimidate, or baffle. The sentence is syntactically ambiguous; one possible parse (marking each ...
The sentence is also used to show the semantic vagueness of the word had, as well as to demonstrate the difference between using a word and mentioning a word. [12] It has also been used as an example of the complexities of language, its interpretation, and its effects on a person's perceptions .
Loaded question. A loaded question is a form of complex question that contains a controversial assumption (e.g., a presumption of guilt ). [ 1] Such questions may be used as a rhetorical tool: the question attempts to limit direct replies to be those that serve the questioner's agenda. [ 2] The traditional example is the question "Have you ...
In rhetoric, zeugma ( / ˈzjuːɡmə / ⓘ; from the Ancient Greek ζεῦγμα, zeûgma, lit. "a yoking together" [ 1]) and syllepsis ( / sɪˈlɛpsɪs /; from the Ancient Greek σύλληψις, sullēpsis, lit. "a taking together" [ 2]) are figures of speech in which a single phrase or word joins different parts of a sentence. [ 3]
Thomas Fowler (1869) states the paradox as follows: "Epimenides the Cretan says, 'that all the Cretans are liars,' but Epimenides is himself a Cretan; therefore he is himself a liar. But if he is a liar, what he says is untrue, and consequently, the Cretans are veracious; but Epimenides is a Cretan, and therefore what he says is true; saying ...
Zeno's arguments may then be early examples of a method of proof called reductio ad absurdum, also known as proof by contradiction. Thus Plato has Zeno say the purpose of the paradoxes "is to show that their hypothesis that existences are many, if properly followed up, leads to still more absurd results than the hypothesis that they are one."