Home › Glossary › Letter B

Brachylogia

Device
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A rhetorical device omitting conjunctions or articles to create terse, rapid, or emphatic phrasing (e.g., “Veni, vidi, vici”).

Detailed Definition
Brachylogia is a rhetorical device involving extreme concision—omitting conjunctions, articles, or even verbs—to create rapid, staccato phrasing; in poetry, this technique generates urgency, intensity, or fragmentation, as seen in Imagist verse (“In a Station of the Metro”) or telegraphic war poetry, where sparse language mirrors psychological or situational extremity.
Example
Example in poetry:
Brachylogia uses extreme brevity—telegraphic style for intensity; Hemingway’s prose influenced poetic brachylogia in war verse; Japanese haiku masters like Bashō exemplify disciplined concision; Modern examples: Kay Ryan’s minimalist philosophical quips; Brachylogia trusts reader to fill vast silences.
Additional Notes
Rhetorical brevity; terse, compressed expression. Greek rhetorical term. Related: ellipsis, concision, laconic style. See also: brachylogical verse. Opposite of pleonasm or periphrasis. Values economy over elaboration.
Also Known As
Brief speech Compressed expression Concise phrasing Abbreviated diction Brachylogy
Skip to main content