FIGURE OF SPEECH

Pronunciation (US):

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does figure of speech mean? 

• FIGURE OF SPEECH (noun)
  The noun FIGURE OF SPEECH has 1 sense:

1. language used in a figurative or nonliteral sense

  Familiarity information: FIGURE OF SPEECH used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FIGURE OF SPEECH (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Language used in a figurative or nonliteral sense

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

figure; figure of speech; image; trope

Hypernyms ("figure of speech" is a kind of...):

rhetorical device (a use of language that creates a literary effect (but often without regard for literal significance))

Domain member usage:

rainy day (a (future) time of financial need)

domino effect (the consequence of one event setting off a chain of similar events (like a falling domino causing a whole row of upended dominos to fall))

flip side (a different aspect of something (especially the opposite aspect))

period (the end or completion of something)

summer (the period of finest development, happiness, or beauty)

dawn (an opening time period)

evening (a later concluding time period)

cakewalk (an easy accomplishment)

lens ((metaphor) a channel through which something can be seen or understood)

helm ((figurative) a position of leadership)

goldbrick (anything that is supposed to be valuable but turns out to be worthless)

housecleaning ((figurative) the act of reforming by the removal of unwanted personnel or practices or conditions)

bell ringer; bull's eye; home run; mark (something that exactly succeeds in achieving its goal)

sleeper (an unexpected hit)

blockbuster; megahit; smash hit (an unusually successful hit with widespread popularity and huge sales (especially a movie or play or recording or novel))

blind alley ((figurative) a course of action that is unproductive and offers no hope of improvement)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "figure of speech"):

conceit (an elaborate poetic image or a far-fetched comparison of very dissimilar things)

irony (a trope that involves incongruity between what is expected and what occurs)

exaggeration; hyperbole (extravagant exaggeration)

kenning (conventional metaphoric name for something, used especially in Old English and Old Norse poetry)

metaphor (a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similarity)

metonymy (substituting the name of an attribute or feature for the name of the thing itself (as in 'they counted heads'))

oxymoron (conjoining contradictory terms (as in 'deafening silence'))

personification; prosopopoeia (representing an abstract quality or idea as a person or creature)

simile (a figure of speech that expresses a resemblance between things of different kinds (usually formed with 'like' or 'as'))

synecdoche (substituting a more inclusive term for a less inclusive one or vice versa)

zeugma (use of a verb with two or more complements, playing on the verb's polysemy, for humorous effect)

 Context examples 

The friendliness of this gentleman, said Mr. Micawber to my aunt, if you will allow me, ma'am, to cull a figure of speech from the vocabulary of our coarser national sports—floors me.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)