American Literature / Unit 1 AML 0004 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Diction: High, Low, and the Distance Between
Captions available
The idea
Diction is the poem's choice of words, and the exam tests the gap between a word and its neighbours. Formal diction lifts a subject, plain diction lowers it, dialect places a speaker in a region and a class. A shift in diction inside a poem is always a signal.
In practice
Formal, plain, dialect: three distances.
Where people slip
A shift midway is the thing to notice.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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