Glossary

The class of words designating things that cannot be filtered through one of the five senses: feelings, hopes, thoughts, ideas, dreams, etc.; see: diction.

The longer division in a play; typically inform the larger structure of the play.

A person who performs as a character within a text (drama, film, and television).

The rendering of an artwork in another medium.

A script that develops from a previous text (i.e., short story, novella, novel, play, poem, a series of these texts).

Camera position in a film that allows the audience to view story action from above.

A story in which the characters are very obviously meant to represent certain ideas or concepts to offer lessons to the reader.

The repetition of consonant sounds, usually at the beginning of words.

Reference to a famous person, place, thing, or event.

Considering a text (written and/or visual) outside of the time period in which it was produced with a more contemporary perspective on its form and content.

Filmmaking that involves chemical processing of celluloid to develop images for the screen.

Process by which you explain to your readers how your evidence functions to support your argument.

A three-syllable metrical foot, unstressed/unstressed/stressed.

To repeat a clause at the beginning of a sentence.

The position from which a camera records a shot, scene, or sequence for visual media (film, TV show/series, commercials, etc.).

Film or television media created from original drawings set to motion.

Digital process used to add motion to original drawings to make animated film or television media.

Beginning to identify and/or make connections with the words on the page of a text.

The character that is opposed to the protagonist; the source of conflict and is often used as a foil to the protagonist.

Reader feels disappointed and/or disillusioned by the nature of the resolution.

A protagonist who lacks traditional heroic qualities and may even have serious character flaws; see: protagonist.

Brainstorming technique in which you ask the reporter’s questions: “Who?”; “What?”; “When?”; “Where?”; and “Why?”.

The repetition of vowel sounds.

Actors reading lines from the script for movie casting.

An image that offers sounds; see: imagery/image.

Filmmaker whose style (use of camera, music, dialogue, etc.) connects their work across the different films they create.

Critical perspective that situates the director of a film as the author of the text.

School of thought that recognizes a filmmaker’s personal style (use of camera, music, dialogue, etc.) over the collaborative effort of the combined cast and crew.

Ways of producing art and literature that operate by chance, randomization, or other aleatory means; see: surrealism.

In general, any movement in the arts that is formally and aesthetically experimental; avant-garde poetry, avant-garde music, etc.

An ancient form of poetry that tells a narrative in short stanzas.

A lapse in mood from the sublime to the trivial.

A genre of novel that explores how a person grows from a child into an adult; German for a “novel of education.”

Systems dependent upon only two, opposing states of being (e.g., good vs. bad, woman vs. man, light vs. dark).

A scripted film or television text that focuses on a historical (real-life) figure often based on a collection of true stories and/or documents to tell a story.

Narrative and/or visual elements considered exaggerated, extreme, unusual, and odd in theatre, film, or television.

A small, interior performance space.

Film or television series shot in black and white monochrome.

A poetic technique wherein the author erases or redacts words from an original text to create a poem.

Type of poem or dramatic speech composed of unrhymed iambic pentameter, making it an effective way of imitating natural speech.

Mainstream movie—often with large-scale special effects—designed to make a lot of revenue in box office sales.

Section of essay not consisting of introduction or conclusion. Composed of body paragraphs, which support, elucidate, and augment the essay’s thesis through evidence and analysis.

Horror film that focuses on the development, modification, mutation, destruction, mutilation, and/or deterioration of the human—and sometimes non-human—body.

Support, elucidate, and augment a literary essay’s thesis.

The terms AND, OR, and NOT, all of which tell the database how to interpret your combination of search terms.

Brainstorming technique in which you write down keywords and ideas and then create visual connections between keywords and ideas through circles and lines; see: webbing.

When actors directly address the audience or acknowledge the meta-theatrical space outside of stage or screen; see: direct narration.

Unpleasant or discordant sounds.

Literally, “cut”; a punctuation break in the middle of a line of poetry.

When an actor is requested to do a second audition or more, read with another actor already hired for a film, and/or complete an interview as part of the casting process.

A brief appearance by a well-known actor or other entertainer in a film or television series.

Mainstay of television and filmmaking equipment used to capture/record story action on celluloid or digitally.

Specific placement and/or handling of the camera to capture/record a shot or sequence for a film or television series.

Darkened enclosure (box or room) with a small hole from which an image is projected onto an opposing screen or wall.

A focus and sensibility on aesthetic style, language systems, exaggeration, performance, and artifice to address social and cultural climates, often utilizing comedy and/or satire to undercut the serious nature of the narrative content.

All the works of literature that get re-printed and regularly studied at schools and universities.

The process of auditioning and hiring actors for a film, play, or television series.

Person in charge of the casting process for a film or television series.

Physical film material of which images are superimposed to create movies and television series; the material has been generally replaced by digital film.

Computer-generated images—often used as special effects and/or for animated films—that enhance the visual look of media.

Technique used in film and television media in which the camera acts as the perspective of a given character; this allows the audience to see from that character’s viewpoint and/or become a part of the story action as if we are witnessing events unfold firsthand; see: point of view.

Individual who designs physical movements in a performance.

Documentary filmmaking and/or a sense of reality within a film whose recorded action does not appear to be under the control of the director or film production.

Fictional space of time created within a film or television series as orchestrated by the editing process.

Person responsible for the visual style (colors, camera use, etc.) of a film or television series; also known as the DP or DoP (director of photography).

The combined visual elements (colors, camera use, etc.) of a film or television series.

Short-form abbreviation for cisgender heterosexual, an individual whose gender identity complements their assigned sex at birth and is attracted to someone of the opposite sex and gender in a binary system.

Conflict is brought into open view and resolved in some way.

The practice of reading a text in a way that tunes itself to form and content, limiting the influence of information from outside the text.

Camera positioned in close proximity to the subject/object which allows for detailed view, intense emotion, and/or personal connection with the viewing audience.

A form of poetry that operates according to set rules; often handed down throughout history; see: fixed form.

A way of speaking confined to a group with shared interests or geography; see: diction.

Film or television series shot in color; red, green, and blue make up the three main layers.

Horror film that incorporates comedy to heighten and/or lesson elements of fear, anxiety, and dread.

Narrative structure common in drama that concludes with a happy ending and provokes laughter. Traditionally focused on major characters who were not meant to be praised or esteemed as these would have been easier to laugh at.

Conventional narrative frame for LGBTQ+ fiction in which the protagonist's coming-of-age is centered upon their coming-out process.

A collection of stories working in conjunction to create a unified whole; see: short story cycle.

A type of poetry based on found elements of appropriation and assimilation organized according to predetermined constraints or concepts, the constraint or concept taking precedence over the content of the final text.

Final section of the paper that establishes a sense of closure for your readers. Reaffirms the thesis and reminds readers of main points of the essay without becoming repetitive.

The class of words that engages the five senses in the mind; see: imagery/image; see: diction.

Genre of poetry where the words take on the shape of the subject of the poem.

Individual who leads an orchestra or other musical ensemble in a performance

A subgenre lyric poetry rooted in revealing and discussing intimate details of the poet’s life; see: lyric poetry.

Occurs between the protagonist (central character) and something else (Chapter 3); usually drives the force of the plot in any narrative fiction.

A word’s unspoken meaning that is often cultural and contextual.

Repetition of consonant clusters within words.

A story’s possible meanings.

Post-production film editing process in which shots and/or sequences are combined to maintain consistency of narrative time and space for a film or television series.

Common symbols easily recognizable by groups of readers; see: symbol.

A type of intellectual property that determines who can use a creative work, where, and for what purposes.

When a character tries to escape their explicit fate but only ends up fulfilling that fate in the process; see: irony.

Wardrobe assigned to an actor that complements their character connected to narrative/historical time and location and personal style.

Individual who researches, sketches, fabricates, and sources clothing and accessories for performers.

Two-line stanzas, or two-line pairings, usually rhymed.

The technical features of an art employed by the artist during the creation of that art.

Term given to a horror film with a monster as the central villain originating in the 1930s.

The cast and crew listing of a film or television series, presented as opening (when the film/series starts) and closing credits (when the film/series ends).

A type of literary analysis in which you can explore the faults of a work of art.

as noun, a husband whose wife has committed or is committing adultery; as verb, the process of making someone a cuckold. Term derives from the practice of Cuckoo birds who lay their fertilized eggs in a different type of bird’s nest in order to deceive that bird into brooding, hatching, and raising the Cuckoo’s offspring; also, to wear the “cuckold’s horns” derives from the image of stags fighting, in which the dominant stag subdues its opponent, and the loser of the challenge forfeits its mate to the winner.

Transition from one scene to another in a film or television series; proclamation issued from a TV/film director to halt filming on set; (n.) one narrative scene/sequence in a film or television series.

An automatic technique that involves cutting up a piece of writing then rearranging it, either with purpose, or randomly, such as drawing the pieces out of a hat; see: automatic techniques.

A three-syllable metrical foot, stressed/unstressed/unstressed.

A word’s dictionary meaning.

French for “unraveling”; an ending that winds down after the climax.

Measure of space between the closest and farthest objects depicted in visual media that are in focus.

Writing meant to sound the way people actually speak when read aloud, usually tied to a region or group.

Conversation between two or more characters.

The general quality or level of the words chosen by the author; individual word choices viewed as a class or group of choices.

Broadly, instructional; when applied to a literary genre, that genre is usually written to teach a lesson, moral or otherwise.

Space and time (setting) within a film’s narrative; the story world.

Sounds that emanate from the onscreen action; see: sound.

A line of two metrical feet.

When actors directly address the audience or acknowledge the meta-theatrical space outside of stage.

Person responsible for overseeing all cast and crew decisions for a film or drama; often credited as the “author” of a film or a dramatic performance.

The final version of a film that represents the director’s vision for the project before it undergoes any changes resulting from the ratings board and production company directives.

A mournful poem or song.

Film transition from one shot to another in which one gradually fades out and the other fades into focus.

Nonfiction film (short or full-length) that attempts to inform its audience about reality-based, historical events; a visual artifact of real life.

Shot in which the camera follows the moving action of the scene, typically mounted on a dolly and advances forward or backward on a rail/track ;also known as a tracking shot.

A rhyming stressed then unstressed syllable; ex: bower/power.

When the reader or audience knows something the characters do not; see: irony.

A poem or portion of a drama wherein a single speaker gives an uninterrupted speech to a single interlocutor at an important moment; see: monologue.

A list of characters that appear in a play usually at the beginning of the text; Latin for “masks of the drama.”

Any sequence from literature or film that portrays a character’s dreams.

Quotation from a primary or secondary source that is not properly introduced and integrated into your own sentence; see: floating quotation.

How much time passes between the story’s beginning and end.

A character who changes significantly over the course of a story.

Post-production process in which shots are put together to finalize a film’s story from beginning to end.

Person responsible for assembling shots to create a film as a final product, taking into account music, dialogue, pacing, different takes, etc.

A narrator that comments and offers judgment over the actions of characters while telling a story; see: narrator.

A poem lamenting the dead or gone.

Any line of poetry that ends on a punctuation mark.

Lines of poetry that do not end on punctuation; see: run-on lines.

A rhyming stanza of ABBA.

Usually long poems depicting the mythic time of origins and beginnings.

Quotations from other works that help to set the tone of the piece.

A sudden realization undergone by a character that changes them.

Literature written as though the characters are corresponding through letters.

Repetition of a clause at the end of a sentence.

First shot of a scene that informs the audience of the narrative setting (time and space).

Individual and communal construction based on a person's cultural, regional, and ancestral descent.

A sound that has a pleasing effect.

Descriptions, examples, details, definitions, comparisons, contrasts, anecdotes, causes and effects that supports your argument. Quotations from, and paraphrases and summaries of, primary and secondary texts often function as evidence in literary essays.

Movies that break from traditional filmmaking conventions to try innovative, unique delivery of narrative content, incorporation of music, camera use, story progression, etc.; most often independent cinema.

A genre of poetry writing that unpacks the form of a poem while not allowing outside influences.

A type of filmmaking intentionally exaggerating social and cultural representations for a niche market seeking independent, financial success.

A metaphor that goes on for four or more lines.

Actor in a film typically hired to add color to the scene such as members of a crowd, patrons of a restaurant, passersby on a sidewalk, etc.; also known as a background actor.

Words that look as though they ought to rhyme but do not.

Early short form of fiction; involve anthropomorphic animals and are meant to convey lessons about human nature and our place in the world.

When a scene gradually turns to a single color, usually black or white; fade-ins occur at the beginning of a film while fade-outs are at the end.

Exceptions for when and how other people can use copyrighted works for purposes such as research, teaching, or news reporting.

Short literary tales often including fairies, dragons, queens, princesses, etc. Often didactic, but a popular form of entertainment.

Description of the aftermath of the conflict, showing the reader where things stand once the conflict has been resolved; this is typically at the end of the short story.

Non-realistic, non-mimetic literature, often with medieval nostalgia.

Narrative and/or documentary film with a runtime typically more than approximately 60 minutes (time length varies); see: full-length.

A metrical unit of syllables.

Critical study of how women are represented in literatures, often in comparison to men within the narrative content.

Special uses of words with impossible denotations that illuminate deeper meanings or provide reflection and perspective.

Stylized classical black-and-white cinema of the 40s and 50s, although the style extends beyond that time period; typically a narrative focus on crime and a visual use of shadows and light to depict deceit, secrecy, and lies.

Based on social-morality codes of the 1930s-1960s; transitioned into the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) with its current system: G, PG, PG-13, R, NC-17, X.

A medium used to create films.

Horror-genre motif--specifically in slasher films--in which the last survivor who must confront the evil force (human or other) is a woman.

A narrator that speaks from their own perspective, often using the pronoun “I”; see: narrator.

In poetry, a traditional, inherited form with a clear set of rules; see: closed form.

Past events narrated in non-linear deviation from the main storyline.

When a character is under-developed and largely represents one dominant character trait.

Quotation from a primary or secondary source that is not properly introduced and integrated into your own sentence; see: dropped quotation.

The blank back page of a print copy of a book.

Point within a frame’s composition that a viewer is drawn to and/or where the camera manipulates a viewer to focus.

A character that’s purpose is to provide a contrast to another character, often the protagonist, to illuminate the character qualities.

Sound effects created in post-production to match action depicted within a film for audio that cannot be captured naturally and/or audio that needs to be enhanced (i.e., breaking a cabbage in half to mimic the sound of a leg breaking); see: sound.

Notes at the bottom of the page that correspond to a section of text usually marked by a numbered superscript.

Elements of a story or tale that hint at events yet to occur.

A story’s arrangement of elements.

Almost always written, determined by the power dynamics of publishing companies and academic discourse; usually reserved for speeches, academic essays, and solemn occasions; also called standard written English; see: diction.

A type of poetry constructed or remixed from pre-existing pieces of writing; for example: a remixed newspaper article.

Type of horror film in which the story action plays out like real-life footage found from someone’s personal camera; used to enhance the reality of the story and cost-effective to production budgets.

Visual space of a single shot taken from a scene or sequence of a film or TV series captured by the camera; the images that appear within the frame of the screen.

Quotation integrated into your writing with appropriate context; see: incorporated quotation.

Refers to the subtle shifting within a story back and forth from third person omniscient to first person narration; this technique allows the reader to get the omniscient narration while also being privy to a character’s inner thoughts and feelings; see: narrator.

Poetry without set rhyme or meter; see: open verse.

Brainstorming strategy in which you write for around 10 minutes without worrying about spelling or punctuation in order to generate ideas and content for your essay.

Narrative and/or documentary film with a runtime typically more than approximately 60 minutes (time length varies); see: feature-length.

Identity expression based on someone's cultural, social, and psychological behaviors and belief systems, independent of and/or complementary to their sexual identity.

A fluid system of categorization full of hybrids and subgenre blends.

Academic study of written and visual texts within their genre categorizations to investigate convention, theory, and innovation.

An Arabic poetic form, usually between 5 and fifteen couplets in length, governed by set rhyme, meter, turns, and topics.

A type of tale that is meant to scare you by appealing to the supernatural.

Type of Italian-horror cinema derived from mystery, suspense, and thriller pulp novels, usally focused on solving a muder, series of murders, or other violent crimes.

Depiction of extreme physical violence in a horror film usually related to body mutilation and graphic depictions of death; an element of splatter horror films.

Dark elements of folk and fairy tales from the oral tradition of storytelling.

Theatre in Paris that focused on horror performances; a tradition of theatrical horror.

Transition between two shots in which their framed elements share similar shape and/or composition.

Combines words and images; see: graphic novel.

A mode of sequential art, like comics, which offers full length stories. The form is rooted in popular genres of storytelling, but has been adopted beyond the realm of superheroes.

Distortion of the human body in horror; generally regarded as anything not normative in appearance in horror.

An image that offers tastes; see: imagery/image.

A Japanese poetic form that consists of a tercet with the set syllable count of 5/7/5.

A set of guidelines developed and implemented by the Motion Picture Production Code--under the governance of William Hays--in the mid 1930s to the late 1960s as a way to police visual and narrative content in cinema.

A character that displays admirable attributes such as strength, bravery, moral rectitude, etc.

A pair of rhyming lines written in iambic pentameter.

Information about the time period in which a text was originally composed.

The time and location in which the story takes place.

Exploring the time period in which a movie was produced regarding sociocultural movements, politics, economic structures, and more to analyze how its ficitonal content may reflect our historical realities.

Horror film that incorporates aspects of romance to heighten an emotional appeal to its audience.

The academic study of horror literatures as a genre, including critical theory and popular culture.

Forms that combine written or spoken word with at least one other major medium.

An extreme exaggeration.

Uncontrollable fear, anger, and emotional outburts, stereotypically associated to women and the concept of "womb madness" in which ancient-Greek medical practitioners believed a woman's emotional state was controlled by her womb that wandered through the body.

A two-syllable metrical foot, unstressed/stressed.

A description using concrete language, often engaging multiple senses at once; see: concrete language.

Metaphors that are not explicit about the comparison being drawn.

Technique in which an actor performs outside of the scripted material; unscripted, spontaneous dialogue and action.

Parenthetical citation within your writing that uses the last name(s) of the author followed by a space and the page number for the source material, when available.

Quotation integrated into your writing with appropriate context; see: framed quotation.

A creative work that has certain rights for the creator or right holder associated with it.

Type of conflict where the strife experienced by the protagonist is internal (i.e., struggle to make a decision, take action, etc.).

Opening section of essay that introduces readers to your topic, provides context related to the assignment and topic, and presents your thesis.

The discrepancy between expectation and reality.

Specialized vocabulary specific to a field of study; see: diction.

Works that writers create when they are children.

Late nineteenth-century device that allowed people to watch films through a peephole; viewings were limited to one person at a time.

A narrative chronicling the artist’s development.

A narrator who tells the story from a third-person perspective who has access to information the protagonist may not, and focuses on the perspective of the events from one character; see: narrator.

an automatic technique wherein a poem or story is written or rewritten by excluding a letter, such as a novel written without the letter “e”; see: automatic techniques.

References to an outside book or story that you might have heard of before.

Books, essays, and articles that analyze literature. Usually falls under the category of secondary sources.

Non-animated film that uses live actors and camera photography for filming.

Customs, behaviors, and characteristics associated with particular regions or subcultures; see: regionalism.

Film shot that is longer than a traditional take in a film and/or longer than the standard duration of most films.

Usually short poems expressing the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker.

Depiction of women as sexualized objects in cinema from the perspective of a heteronormative male for his viewing pleasure.

An extremely popular form of Japanese graphic narrative that is read from right to left.

Critical theory that investigates literatures based on their depictions of socio-economic class structures and powered systems of authority.

The materials used by the artists to create their art; examples: film, written word, paint, the body (dancers), etc.; see: mixed media.

A figurative comparison that uses the verb ‘to be’ to create an equivalency.

Rhythm in verse.

Technique used by actors to completely immerse themselves within a character portrayal and emotionally connect to the role, often staying in performance mode even when not filming.

Uses a closely related idea or object to stand-in for something.

All production elements—including setting and actors—in front of the camera for filming; also related to the theatrical staging of a play.

Artworks that employ more than one medium; see: mediums.

Any extended speech by a single person; see: dramatic monologue.

A metrical foot of one syllable.

Combination of shots used to convey narrative progression, the passage of time, and/or set an emotional tone for a film.

Repeating and meaningful pattern or image that may signal multiple different themes.

Score (typically instrumental) and/or soundtrack accompaniment to a film.

An automatic technique, invented by the avant-garde school of poetry called Oulipo. Nouns are replaced by the next noun seven places up or down in the dictionary. Can be applied to any part of speech; see: automatic techniques.

A narrator who sees the story through a lens of innocence and fails to understand matters that come from adult experience; naive narrators are usually children; see: narrator.

A narrator with their own personality, opinions, and judgements, even though they do not take part in the story; see: narrator.

Poems that tell a story with a clear narrative structure.

The voice telling the story; see: editorializing narrator; first-person narrator; free indirect discourse; limited narrator; naïve narrator; narrative persona; non-participant narrator; objective narrator; omniscient narrator; participant narrator; second-person narrator; third-person narrator; unreliable narrator.

A subset of realism that includes a focus on pessimistic determinism, the idea that we are subject to forces—natural, social, or biological—that are beyond our control.

Rhyme that is not quite exact; see: slant rhyme.

Processed film strips containing consecutive images captured by the camera.

Primarily meant for entertainment.

Sound added during post-production; see: sound.

A narrator who tells the story from outside the events in the third-person; see: narrator.

Established systems, standards of practice, and conventional methods agreed upon by a social unit or community-at-large, quite often utilized as a short-form term for heteronormative.

A long work of prose fiction in which the characters have complex inner lives

A narrator that merely tells the story without offering judgment over the actions of the characters; see: narrator.

An eight-line stanza.

Poem meant to valorize a person, object, idea, or place.

An image that offers smells; see: imagery/image.

All-seeing; the narrator knows and can describe everything in the storyworld; see: narrator.

A word imitating a sound.

Poems not confined to any pre-set rules or strictures, are only limited by the imaginations and materials of the poet.

An author’s work that is selected for possible purchase and eventual filming.

An individual perceived as located outside established systems, standards of practice, and conventional methods agreed upon by a social unit or community-at-large.

Organized list of main points of your essay that shows hierarchical relationship between ideas and points.

Camera shot positioned directly above the action of the story.

Two contradictory terms that seem to cancel each other out.

The narrative progression of a film.

Single-framed scenes within a comic book.

Similar to fables in purpose, but do not usually include talking animals; primary purpose is to teach people a lesson.

Seemingly contradictory set of propositions that upon further reflection reveals a deeper truth.

A way of writing subordinate sentence parts with matching syntax.

The rewording of a portion of someone else’s text in which you put it into your own words and use your own sentence structure.

A first-person narrator who recounts events that happened to them; see: narrator.

Having other people (usually your classmates) look at your writing and offer advice and suggestions to make it better.

A pseudonym employed by an author.

A line of five metrical feet.

Type of conflict where the protagonist is against the natural world.

Type of conflict where the protagonist has some strife against another character.

Type of conflict where the protagonist is against societal forces such as poverty, sexism, and/or racism.

Comes from the Latin word for mask; in poetry, when an author takes on the voice of a speaker who is a character distinct from the author; in narrative fiction, when a narrator takes on their own personality, opinions, and judgements, even though they do not take part in the story.

Will contain exactly fourteen lines written in iambic pentameter; the fourteen lines will be organized into an octet usually rhyming ABBA ABBA, and a sestet with a variable rhyme scheme. The Turn will occur between the octet and sestet; see: sonnet.

Not giving proper credit to the intellectual work—including ideas and words—of others.

Events that happen over the course of a story; in short stories, plots tend to follow certain patterns that lead to satisfying and engaging stories.

The perspective of the storytelling (first-person, third-person, etc.), and the way in which the reader perceives the events of a story.

Elements that are added after filming concludes (i.e., editing, special effects creations).

Typically original sources upon which scholars base other research. Primary sources have not been filtered through analysis or evaluation and are fixed in the time period involved. Letters, diaries, manuscripts, and even social media posts are common types of primary sources.

Person responsible for the production of a film, often including finances, hiring of cast and crew, and scheduling with the movie studio.

Companies that oversaw the development of Hollywood through the development and filming of a specific production or media broadcast; “The Big Five” included MGM, Paramount Pictures, RKO Radio Pictures, 20th Century Fox, and Warner Bros.

Measured use of production resources in a film.

The process of reviewing each sentence in your writing assignment, identifying and correcting errors in sentence grammar, sentence structure, spelling, and punctuation.

A style of stage which has one side open to the audience; the other three sides are only available to the actors and set crew and are not intended to be viewed.

Written or spoken language that does not follow an intentional meter.

A poem written as a small chunk of prose with often heightened attention to language or an underlying concept.

Central character of a story.

Theoretical perspective and study based on how a viewer's subconscious and/or unconscious state of being receives visual and narrative content from a film toward a pleasurable experience and interpretation.

Type of horror focused on elements of the psyche (i.e., emotions, dreams, deception, mental health, etc.).

When an item’s copyright term ends.

A genre of popular novels named after the pulp paper they were printed on.

Play on words that sound alike but have different meanings.

Prose with a lot of ornate description.

A two-syllable metrical foot, unstressed/unstressed.

A four-line stanza.

Umbrella term for individuals who self-identify as part of the LGBTQIA community, noted for its historical derogatory use and more contemporary reclamation as a symbol of empowerment.

A way of examining form and content of literatures beyond heteronormative constructions and conventions, including--but not limited to--LGBTQIA readings and interpretations.

Noncomformity to established, traditional, and/or conventional identity structures, most often divergent to heteronormative standards.

Consecutive shots edited in rapid succession; often used to depict intensity and/or disorder.

A five-line stanza.

Text directly repeated that belongs to someone else.

Human-constructed categorization of people based on physical, social, and cultural systems, often assigning stereotypes for labeling.

A subgenre/literary movement that strives to faithfully represent reality, which it assumes to be a balance of subjective, internal realities and objective, external realities.

When a film picks up in the same established universe, work, or series, and discards continuity to recreate its characters, plotlines, and backstory from the beginning.

When a role is taken over by a different actor than originally cast.

A literary genre in which the author attempts to give the reader a realistic depiction of a certain place, the people who live there, and the culture and customs by which they live; also known as local color; see: local color.

When a film that is based upon and retells the story of an earlier production in the same medium.

Companies rather than authors owned several plays in their repertoire that could be performed at nearly any given time.

Where things stand in the aftermath of the conflict.

Revision strategy in which you take a completed draft of their paper and remove all of the supporting content so you are left with your thesis and your topic sentences--in other words a bullet-point list that allows you to see the structure of your paper in a quick glance.

A second (or third or fourth) look at your essay’s “big picture” when you focus on organizational structure, content, transitions and overall coherence.

Four-line stanzas with a clear rhyming pattern.

Establishing the conflict and building tension to its inevitable resolution; most of the story.

Complex, three-dimensional characters with a variety of personality traits, some of which may even conflict.

Concept in which a frame is divided into three chapters—vertically and horizontally; emphasis is placed on ensuring focal points of a frame fall onto one or more of the intersecting chapters to draw the attention of the viewer.

Lines that do not end on a punctuation mark; see: enjambment.

A form of verbal irony that employs mockery; see: irony; verbal irony.

Act of analyzing a poem’s rhythms.

Shorter divisions in plays and films.

Syntactical patterns that affect the meaning of a passage through the creation of symmetry or shifting emphasis onto or away from particular words.

Horror film that incorporates elements of science fiction, typically space, time, and scientific experimentation.

A subgenre of non-realistic literature that creates new and fantastic worlds tethered in a material and scientific understanding of the natural world.

Original music composed for a film; often used to set the tone and highlight genre elements.

A narrator that directly addresses the reader(s) as “you”; pulling the reader in as a character in the story; see: narrator.

Texts often created using primary sources. They typically involve analysis or evaluation of primary sources, typically with the benefit of hindsight or distance from the time period involved. Commentaries, criticisms, and histories are a few common types of secondary texts.

A seven-line stanza.

A series of scenes that make a cohesive story segment.

Novels published a few chapters at a time in a periodical.

A six-line stanza at the end of a sonnet.

This poetic form consists of six stanzas and a final tercet. The last words of each line in the first stanza are repeated at the ends of the lines of subsequent stanzas according to a preset order. The final tercet or envoy also repeats all six words, two per line.

Constructed or natural environment used in film in which narrative action takes place.

Individual who draws and often creates physical settings for performances.

The technical name for a six-line stanza of poetry when that stanza does not end a sonnet; see: sestet.

Will contain exactly fourteen lines written in iambic pentameter; the fourteen lines written in iambic pentameter will be organized into four rhyming four-line stanzas, quatrains, and the poem will take a turn (volta) in tone either after the first octet or before the final couplet; see: sonnet.

Filmmaking practice in casting in which an ensemble of actors work together on several different productions under the helm of the same director, akin to stage-company plays from William Shakespeare.

A script that is created specifically for movie production that typically serves to help the director and cinematographer decide what order to film scenes, what changes need to be made, and so forth.

A collection of short stories in which each of the stories could stand alone, but are held together by setting, theme, or even recurring characters. There is no overarching plot in a cycle, but the stories feel more connected than in a typical short story collection; regionalist writers often publish stories together in this way; see: composite novel.

Type of film with an approximate runtime of 40 minutes or less (time length varies).

A series of frames within a film.

Papers that contained only one actor's lines and cues.

A figurative comparison using a comparison word. (i.e., like, as, resembles, etc.).

Rhyme occurs on a final, stressed syllable; ex: confer/defer.

A discrepancy between actions and their intended consequences; see: irony.

Another precursor to the short story; offer a brief description of a place, such as a region, a town, a city, etc.; it has no real characters or discernable plot; meant to inform its audience about the characteristics of a place they have never been.

Words that carry connotations far removed from their denotative meanings; see: diction.

Rhyme that is not quite exact; see: near rhyme.

Type of horror film made popular in the 70s and 80s typically featuring a villain or set of villains killing groups of people one by one in violent manners.

Film sequence shot with a high-speed camera meant to give the appearance of action moving slowly when the footage is played at a normal rate of speed.

An extended dramatic passage where a character gives their speech alone on stage; see: monologue.

A fourteen line poem with set forms and themes; see: Shakespearean (English); Petrarchan (Italian).

The audible elements of a film or TV series; see: diegetic sound; Foley sound; non-diegetic sound.

Individual in charge of sourcing and incorporating sound into a performance.

Post-production process of matching sound levels among all scenes shot for consistency, including music (score and soundtrack), Foley sound, and diegetic sounds.

A literary genre that had its heyday in the antebellum nineteenth century in which writers would share humorous tales from the American frontier.

The voice that speaks the poem, as opposed to the author.

Standard screenplay; created by a writer who hopes to have their work optioned.

Visual effects—usually added in post-production—incorporated into a film to enhance a scene or sequence (i.e., explosions, green-screen use, color alterations, etc.); practical effects such as makeup are created and filmed during production.

Technique in film and television used to physically showcase the frame in two or more divisions; often used to show related action happening at the same time and/or a montage of scenes to advance time in the story.

A subgenre of poetry that emphasizes performance; the power of the piece rests on poetic elements and the strengths of the performer.

A two-syllable metrical foot, stressed/stressed.

A type of poetic rhythm meant to approximate natural speech. With sprung rhythm, there are usually four stressed syllables per line, and an indeterminate number of unstressed syllables. The metric feet can range from one to four syllables (in traditional rhythms, the longest metric feet are dactyls and anapest, which have three syllables.) There is also a preponderance of spondees.

Paratextual elements that are usually set off from the rest of the script by italics or some other visual cue that indicates that these lines are not meant to be read but to be performed or to be used in the staging of a play.

The substantially uniform English used in schools, churches, courthouses, markets, train stations, etc.; widely recognized as acceptable wherever there are English speakers; there are also different national standards, such as American Standard and British Standard; see: diction.

A “paragraph” of poetry; there are different names for stanzas of different lengths; see: couplet; triplet; tercet; quatrain; quintain; quintet; septet; sestet; sexain; octet.

How much influence a well-known actor brings to a film regarding audience draw and box-office revenue.

A character that experiences no essential change from the story’s beginning to its end.

Fictional characters who do not evolve from their established beliefs, actions, physicality, and situation in life over the course of the narrative.

Graphic illustration like a comic book with panels, action, and dialogue used by filmmakers to envision and organize the story content.

Theoretical perspective and study based on the use of codes and conventions in film to convey interpretive messaging to viewing audiences in a comparable manner to communication through written and/or spoken languages.

The placement of the words, narrative structure, etc.

Shorter or less developed plots that occur alongside the primary plot and that are often identifiable by not being as important to the main character(s) and containing fewer significant events than the primary plot; see: plot.

A reader-interpreted and/or author-created underlying narrative message and/or theme.

Captions displayed at the bottom of a film that translate or describe the dialogue or narrative.

The use of your own words to communicate the main ideas of someone else’s text in a condensed form.

Type of horror film whose narrative content focuses on unnatural elements and character representations (demons, witches, vampires, possession, religious occurrences, etc.).

A school of avant-garde, experimental art that emphasizes automatic techniques, techniques that subvert the conscious mind to explore the unconscious and irrational.

A thing that represents more than its literal meaning.

An act a character does that carries symbolic weight beyond just the physical action.

Uses a part of something to stand in for the whole.

The deliberate mixing or confusion of two or more senses within an image; see: imagery/image.

Basic element of prose; sentence structure.

In film and drama, when the actors and director read the story to see how it will flow and to create chemistry between the characters that are being brought to life.

An image that offers textures or touches; see: imagery/image.

Story meant to entertain the reader by inspiring wonder, amazement, or fear.

Make no pretense to being instructive, but they are mostly meant to be entertaining.

A three-line stanza; see: triplet.

A series of tercets with the following rhyme scheme: aba bcb cdc, etc.

A line of four metrical feet.

The version of a film that is shown in theaters that has been agreed upon by all parties responsible for the filmmaking, most notably the production company.

Some larger meaning, idea, discussion or subtext contained in any work of art, written, visual, or otherwise, as distinct from the surface level subjects.

A group of related ideas or theories that can be used to examine a text in a particular way.

Central argument.

A narrator that tells the plot without using “I” pronouns; the narrator in this style seems disembodied from the text because they are likely not a character; see: limited narrator; omniscient narrator; narrator.

Stages that extend into the audience space and are surrounded by the audience on three sides (i.e., Shakespeare’s Globe).

When a film presents their title and key production and cast members, utilizing conceptual visuals and sound.

The attitude of the text toward its subject and themes.

Sentence presenting the topic of the body paragraph. Functions similar to a thesis statement for an individual paragraph.

See: dolly shot.

Narrative structure common in drama. Traditionally follows at least one esteemable character whose inevitable fate is determined by an unintentional tragic error based on the character’s flaws.

Words and phrases that help writers move from one idea to the next while showing the connection between these ideas.

A line of three metrical feet.

A three-line stanza; see: tercet.

A two-syllable metrical foot, stressed/unstressed.

Figures of speech that shape or alter the meanings of words.

Tropes that link two unrelated subjects together to form a comparison (e.g. analogies, similes, and metaphors).

Tropes that alter the literal meaning of a word, usually for dramatic or sarcastic effect (e.g. irony, hyperbole, and litotes).

Tropes that link two subjects that already have a concrete connection with one another (e.g. metonymy and synecdoche).

In poetry, a shift in tone; see: volta.

Camera shot that depicts two characters within the same frame.

Continually casting an actor in a specific type of role and/or character.

A figure of speech that downplays the severity or gravity of an event.

A narrator whose version of events cannot be trusted; see: narrator.

Diagram with overlapping circles to show relationships between ideas and concepts. Often used as part of brainstorming and developing research terms.

The discrepancy between words and their meaning; saying one thing, but meaning another; see: sarcasm; irony.

An appearance of reality,

Written or spoken text that follows rules for sound and rhythm.

A character who opposes the hero and acts as their foil.

A French closed form of poetry. A series of five tercets ending in a quatrain, the first and third lines are alternatively repeated at the end of each stanza, and both are repeated at the end of the final stanza.

An image that engages sight; see: imagery/image.

Writer’s unique style that emerges from combination of word choice, sentence structure, tone, and point of view.

Narration that exists outside the story world to discuss events unfolding within the film; also a technique used to give voice to characters in animated films.

In poetry, a shift in tone; see: turn.

Brainstorming technique in which you write down keywords and ideas and then create visual connections between keywords and ideas through circles and lines; see: branching.

Absences in poetry; used to convey breath and/or meaning.

Film transition in which one shot is replaced by another traversing one side of the frame to another side.

Brainstorming technique in which you write down possible definitions, synonyms, and antonyms for your chosen word or concept.

Page found at the end of your MLA-formatted paper or project, which includes all of the sources used when developing that paper or project. References are listed in alphabetical order by the first item in each entry.

Series of steps taken to create a text. Includes some combination of research, prewriting, outline, drafting, revising, editing, and peer review.

Literature geared toward a younger audience, with appropriate themes.

Type of horror film with a central focus on zombies as the main conflict; related to the infection/contagion film in which people become physically affected by a form of contaminant.

Late 19th Century device created by Eadweard Muybridge to showcase images; precursor to the modern projector.