Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole (as hand for sailor), the whole for a part (as the law for police officer), the specific for the general (as cutthroat for assassin), the general for the specific (as thief for pickpocket), or the material for the thing made from it (as steel for sword).
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In rhetoric, a figure or trope by which the whole of a thing is put for a part, or a part for the whole, as the genus for the species, or the species for the genus, etc.: as, for example, a fleet of ten sail (for ships); a master employing new hands (for workmen). Compare metonymy.
Wiktionary
- n. A figure or trope by which a part of a thing is put for the whole, the whole for a part, the species for the genus, the genus for the species, or the name of the material for the thing made, and similar.
- n. The use of synecdoche; synecdochy.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A figure or trope by which a part of a thing is put for the whole (as, fifty
sail for fiftyships ), or the whole for a part (as, the smilingyear forspring ), the species for the genus (as,cutthroat forassassin ), the genus for the species (as, acreature for aman ), the name of the material for the thing made, etc.
WordNet 3.0
- n. substituting a more inclusive term for a less inclusive one or vice versa
Etymologies
- Middle English synodoches, from Medieval Latin synodoche, alteration of Latin synecdochē, from Greek sunekdokhē, from sunekdekhesthai, to take on a share of : sun-, syn- + ekdekhesthai, to understand (ek-, out of; see eghs in Indo-European roots + dekhesthai, to take; see dek- in Indo-European roots).
Examples
“Bill would have found a way to include the word "synecdoche" somewhere in that last sentence.”
The Wall Street Journal: Buckley, If Not God, Returns to Yale
“The literary term synecdoche -- confusing a part for a whole -- is helpful in understanding how late twentieth-century Americans constructed an image of youth in crisis, as shocking episodes reinforced an impression that childhood was disintegrating.”
“In the informative spirit of today's Chat Update, I should point out that genericide is a form of the twinned literary term "synecdoche" and "metonymy,”
The Washington Post: National, World & D.C. Area News and Headlines - The Washington Post
“Should I be ashamed to admit that I have found recourse to the word synecdoche in many conversations, several of them about the film itself?”
“In the figure we call synecdoche, a part of the whole becomes a name for the whole, or vice versa as in "sixty head of cattle" or "fifty sails.”
“Why, regardless of place and culture, do people insist upon this bizarre synecdoche, which is even permitted to become almost literal in the case of Dear Leader Kim Jong-il and his god-like father -- all other North Koreans being, in effect, little more than their bodily extensions?”
“And he says that this rule applies in two ways: either to the figure of speech called synecdoche, or to legitimate numbers.”
“One step farther, and Theobald would have discovered the true solution: he only required to know that _the shoes_, by a figure of rhetoric called synecdoche, may stand for the whole character and attributes of Hercules, to have saved himself the trouble of conjecturing an ingenious, though infinitely worse word, as a substitute.”
“Here we have a synecdoche, which is the result of a function shift, which in turn is a clipping of picture tube.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘synecdoche’.
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G[r]eek
A collection of words found in English that are either purely Greek or have Greek etymology.
Please add with caution and certainty. Will be regularly updated by me.etymology, philosophy, laconic, disharmony, patriarchic, archaic, phlogiston, aether, aeon, angel, arachnid, rhythm and 322 more...
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Words
phantasmagoria, eviscerate, avast, simulacrum, varicose, oblique, gestalt, ersatz, vernal, vivace, stellate, synecdoche and 314 more...
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Rhetorical Devices
syllepsis, zeugma, trope, wellerism, anastrophe, anaphora, apostrophe, metonymy, chiasmus, antimetabole, syncope, open-list and 431 more...
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Wordplay & Pun
wordplay, pound, conceit, clinch, joke, quibble, equivoque, double-entendre, quillet, calembour, carriwitchet, paranomasia and 89 more...
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cicatrix
scar tissue
minatory, naira, Cluniac, embracive, prolix, hierophant, timorous, adduce, veracious, dysphoric, sang-froid, vitiate and 414 more...
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Gram-Lang
pleonastic, synecdoche, solecism, virgule, fricative, altiloquent, chrestomathy, orthography, mondegreen, polysemy, zeugma, Syllepsis and 6 more...
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Sound Sex
taciturn, deflower, recursive, parapraxis, comitative, atelic, awkward, eccentric, libidinous, astereognosis, aloof, moonglade and 44 more...
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Words with unusual spellings or pronunciations
Herein are listed words with oddball spellings and words whose pronunciation does not reflect the spelling.
eleemosynary, Wednesday, colonel, posslq, zaqqum, qwerty, cinquefoil, qibla(h), minuscule, Cholmondeley, polyphloisboian, ptisan and 67 more...
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syn-, sym-, syl-
united; acting or considered together
sympathy, syllogism, synthesis, synonym, synaesthesia, synecdoche, synagogue, syzygy, symbiosis, system, idiosyncratic, idiosyncracy and 3 more...
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graphism
of or related to drawing—forms, tools, techniques, processes, practices, etc.
limn, vectorial, limned, synecdoche, adumbrate, lapis, colophon, grapheme, isogloss, sciagraphy, palimpsest, homunculus and 2 more...
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Terms for AP Lit
This list is designed to be a reference for my AP Lit. students
symbolism, archetype, polysyndeton, ellipsis, anaphora, diction, asyndeton, chiasmus, syntax, oxymoron, logos, fallacy and 28 more...
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Script-ure: Words about Words
escritoire, typography, amphigory, interrobang, synecdoche, kern
rolig I love the old Judy Garland flick, Metonymy St. Louis! Jan 2, 2009
seanahan I joked last week about wanting to see the new movie "Metonymy New York", but none of my friends got it. Jan 1, 2009
Telofy Ack, will I always have to keep learning? Won't I ever experience a sense of lasting satisfaction? Ok, just kidding, I guess. Kaufman was interviewed on The Colbert Report, only it seems the full episode has become rather unavailable at my destination for Colbert Nation procrastination... Dec 27, 2008
atourgates After learning about synecdoche in a literature class, I was so proud of my elitism in understanding it. Now, Kaufman's ruined everything. Oct 28, 2008
npydyuan See also metonymy.
Oct 12, 2007
john See Erin McKean, lexicographer to the stars, using "synecdochial" here. Sep 28, 2007