Scheme (Linguistics) (Paperback)

High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! In linguistics, scheme is a figure of speech that changes the normal arrangement of words in a sentence's structure. A good example of a playwright who is notorious for his use of schemes and tropes is William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Julius Caesar). A figure of speech is a use of a word that diverges from its normal meaning, or a phrase with a specialized meaning not based on the literal meaning of the words in it such as a metaphor, simile, or personification. Figures of speech often provide emphasis, freshness of expression, or clarity. However, clarity may also suffer from their use, as any figure of speech introduces an ambiguity between literal and figurative interpretation. A figure of speech is sometimes called a rhetoric or a locution. Not all theories of meaning have a concept of "literal language" (see literal and figurative language). Under theories that do not, figure of speech is not an entirely coherent concept.