Symbolism

Symbolism

Symbolism is the use of a concrete object to represent an abstract idea. It is a figure of speech that is used when an author wants to create a certain mood or emotion in a work of literature. Symbolism is in colors, nature and poetry. To comprehend more about color symbolism it is important to know that it can vary on culture and circumstances. Each color has impact on people, energy is expressed depending on the color. The following chart demonstrates colors and its meaning.
 

An excellent and clear example of symbolism in poetry is on "Still I Rise" poem from Maya Angelou. It contains metaphors, similes, hyperboles, imagery and repetition.

Below, a brief summary about Maya Angelou's biography


Poet, Author, Civil Rights Activist (1928–2014)

Early Years

• Multi-talented barely seems to cover the depth and breadth of Maya Angelou's accomplishments. She was an author, actress, screenwriter, dancer and poet. Born Marguerite Annie Johnson, Angelou had a difficult childhood. 
• As an African American, Angelou experienced firsthand racial prejudices and discrimination in Arkansas. She also suffered at the hands of a family associate around the age of 7: During a visit with her mother, Angelou was raped by her mother's boyfriend.

The following are some examples of symbolism:

Imagery

Does my sassiness upset

you?

Why are you beset with

gloom?

'Cause I walk like I've got

oil wells

Pumping in my living room

  
(Oil wells are very valuable = rich)

   (Represents confidence the poet has in herself)

  Hyperbole

  You may shoot me with your

 words,

   You may cut me with your

  eyes,

   You may kill me with your

    hatefulness,

  But still, like air, I'll rise.

(The poet mentioned shooting, cutting and killing and related to words, eyes and hatefulness)

 Metaphor

 I'm a black ocean,

 leaping and wide,

 Welling and swelling I

 bear in the tide

 The poet is comparing "me" and the "black ocean"

 Opinion

Firstly, is important to know how to analize figures of speech, such as this poem. FOS provides a meaning to the poem in all verses; it also allows reader to be more interested when FOS represent ideas. 

Also, "Still I Rise" poem clearly addressed to the white oppressors of black persons, the poem presents us with a black woman willing to speak up for herself, for other living blacks, and even for her black ancestors. The poem is both highly political and highly personal. The speaker is implicitly responding to decades and even centuries of oppression and mistreatment. Her tone, then, never sounds arrogant or cocky. Instead, most readers are likely to feel immense sympathy with her spirited rejection of further oppression.

Week 1. Figures of Speech

Figures of Speech

A word that has a meaning kind of different than its literal meaning, such as metaphors, simile, hyperbole, onomatopoeia, imagery, oxymoron, alliteration, anaphora and epiphora, flashback and foreshadowing.

The following are the meaning and differences of each figure of speech, each has an example.

Metaphor and Simile differences.

• Methaphor is a word or phrase to compare two unlike objects, ideas. On the other hand, simile is two unlike things that are compared using the word "like" or "as" followed by a figurative example.

Examples:

• "You are the apple of my eyes"
• "He is as hungry as a horse"

Imagery

• Formation of mental images, figures. Use senses.

Oxymoron

• Oxymoron, plural oxymora, is a figure of speech in which two opposite ideas are joined to create an effect.
• Examples: 

1. Open secret
2. Tragic comedy
3. Awfully pretty

Alliteration 

Is a term that describes a literary stylistic device. Alliteration occurs when a series of words in a row (or close to a row) have the same first consonant sound.  

• The best way to spot alliteration being used in a sentence is to sound out the sentence, looking for the words with the identical consonant sounds.

1. Alice’s aunt ate apples and acorns around August.
2. Becky’s beagle barked and bayed, becoming bothersome for Billy.

Anaphora and Epiphora differences

• Anaphora is an antonym of epistrophe.
   
• Anaphora is a repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or sentences, while epiphora is the repetition of a word or phrase at the end of a sentence in quick succession.

Examples

Anaphora

London by William Blake
In every cry of every man,
In every infant's cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forged manacles I hear.

  
Epiphora

The sky was bright. Her smile was bright. My heart was bright.
  

Onomatopoeia, hyperbole, flashback and foreshadowing difference.

• Onomatopoeia refers to a word that phonetically mimics or resembles the sound of the thing it describes. For example, the words we use to describe the noises that animals make are all onomatopoetic, such as a dog’s “bark,” a cat’s “meow,” or a coo’s “moo.”

• Hyperbole is the use of obvious and deliberate exaggeration. Hyperbolic statements are often extravagant and not meant to be taken literally. These statements are used to create a strong impression and add emphasis.

•  The definition of hyperbole comes from the Greek for “to throw beyond” or “exaggeration.”

 Flashback and Foreshadowing differences

• A flashback reveals something about the story or characters that the reader doesn't know. Flashbacks often set up events that will occur in the story or explain a character’s motives based on past behavior.While foreshadowing is a technique used to hint at things to come. The purpose is to create tension within the reader by insinuating possible scenarios for later use in the story.

References

Literary Devices. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://literarydevices.net/oxymoron/

Literary Devices. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://www.literarydevices.com/epiphora/

Metaphors.com. (2012). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://www.metaphors.com/

Synonym. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://classroom.synonym.com/narrative-storytelling-techniques-1645.html

The Difference-Between. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://the-difference-between.com/epistrophe/anaphora

Your Dictionary. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2015, from http://examples.yourdictionary.com/alliteration-examples.html