Editing Catachresis

{{Short description|Rhetorical misuse of a term}}
{{Distinguish|catechesis}}
{{Wiktionary}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2019}}
'''Catachresis''' (from [[Greek language|Greek]] {{lang|grc|κατάχρησις}}, "misuse"), originally meaning a [[Semantics|semantic]] misuse or error, is also the name given to many different types of figures of speech in which a word or phrase is being applied in a way that significantly departs from conventional (or traditional) usage.<ref>{{cite book|author=Anshuman Sharma|title=The Impact – The Art of Communicating Eloquently|date=16 April 2014|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vsro-gP1spMC&pg=PA78|publisher=Anshuman Sharma|isbn=978-1-105-99521-7|page=78}}</ref> Examples of the original meaning include using "militate" for "mitigate", "chronic" for "severe", "travesty" for "tragedy", "anachronism" for "anomaly", "alibi" for "excuse", etc. As a rhetorical figure, catachresis may signify an unexpected or implausible metaphor.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lanham |first=Richard A. |title=A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms |publisher=University of California Press |year=1991 |isbn=0-520-07669-9 |edition=2nd |location=Berkeley |pages=31}}</ref>

==Variant definitions==

There are various characterizations of catachresis found in the literature.

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|- valign="top"
! Definition !! Example
|- valign="top"
| Crossing categorical boundaries with words, because there otherwise would be no suitable word.<ref>[[Max Black]] discusses this phenomenon at some length, designating them catachrestic substitution metaphors: Black, M., ''Models and Metaphors: Studies in Language and Philosophy'' (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1962).</ref><ref name="Stolow2012">Pierre Fontanier, ''Les Figures du discours'' (Paris: Flammarion, 1977 [orig. 1821–1830]), p. 214.</ref>|| The sustainers of a chair being referred to as ''legs''.
|- valign="top"
| Replacing an expected word with another, [[half rhyme|half rhyming]] (or a partly sound-alike) word, with an entirely different meaning from what one would expect (cf [[malapropism]], [[Spoonerism]], [[aphasia]]).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.03.0082%3Apart%3DTropes%3Asubpart%3DCatachresis |title=Henry Peachum., The Garden of Eloquence (1593): Tropes, part Tropes, Catachresis |publisher=Perseus.tufts.edu |accessdate=13 May 2013}}</ref> || ''I'm ravished!'' for "I'm ravenous!" or for "I'm famished!"  "They build a ''horse''" instead of they build a house.
|- valign="top"
| The strained use of an already existing word or phrase.<ref name="Sickle2010">{{cite book|author=John Van Sickle|title=Virgil's Book of Bucolics, the Ten Eclogues Translated into English Verse: Framed by Cues for Reading Aloud and Clues for Threading Texts and Themes|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ccgliv5fUPIC&pg=PA18|date=29 December 2010|publisher=JHU Press|isbn=978-0-8018-9961-4|page=18}}</ref>
|| "Tis deepest winter in Lord Timon's purse" – [[Shakespeare]], ''[[Timon of Athens]]''
|- valign="top"
| The replacement of a word with a more ambiguous synonym (cf [[euphemism]]).<ref name="Clogan1997">{{cite book|author=Paul Maurice Clogan|title=Historical Inquiries|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3biBSyTkc7IC&pg=PA19|date=1 January 1997|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-0-8476-8674-2|page=19}}</ref>
|| Saying ''job-seeker'' instead of "unemployed".
|}

==Examples==
Dead people in a graveyard being referred to as '''inhabitants''' is an example of catachresis.<ref name="Arac2011">{{cite book|author=Jonathan Arac|title=Impure Worlds: The Institution of Literature in the Age of the Novel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1ldJNr0k--4C&pg=PA143|year=2011|publisher=Fordham Univ Press|isbn=978-0-8232-3178-2|page=143}}</ref>

Example from [[Alexander Pope]]'s ''[[Peri Bathous, Or the Art of Sinking in Poetry]]'':
<blockquote>Masters of this [catachresis] will say,
:'''Mow''' the beard,
:'''Shave''' the grass,
:'''Pin''' the plank,
:'''Nail''' my sleeve.<ref>Pope, ''Peri Bathous, Or the Art of Sinking in Poetry'', x</ref></blockquote>

==Use in literature==
Catachresis is often used to convey extreme emotion or alienation. It is prominent in [[baroque]] literature and, more recently, in [[dada]]ist and [[surrealism|surrealist]] literature.{{citation needed|date=May 2022}}

==Use in philosophy and criticism==
In [[Jacques Derrida]]'s ideas of [[deconstruction]], catachresis refers to the original incompleteness that is a part of all systems of meaning. He proposes that metaphor and catachresis are tropes that ground philosophical discourse.<ref>Clarification needed: the tradition of Sausserian linguistics in which Derrida works holds that the relation between ''all'' signifiers and their signifieds is an arbitrary one.</ref>{{citation needed|date=May 2022}}

[[Postcolonial]] theorist [[Gayatri Spivak]] applies this word to "master words" that claim to represent a group, ''e.g.'', women or the [[proletariat]], when there are no "true" examples of "woman" or "proletarian". In a similar way, words that are imposed upon people and are deemed improper{{by whom|date=May 2022}}<!--in what way?--> thus denote a catachresis, a word with an arbitrary{{clarification needed|date=May 2022}} connection to its meaning.{{citation needed|date=May 2022}}

==See also==
* {{anl|Cacography}}
* {{anl|Doublespeak}}
* {{anl|Figure of speech}}
* {{anl|Malapropism}}
* {{anl|Metaphor}}
* {{anl|Peter Piper#Peter Piper Principle|Peter Piper Principle|wedge=tendency of word mix-ups, named after|dash=:}}
* {{anl|Rhetoric}}
* {{anl|Skunked term}}

==Reading==
* {{cite book | last = Ghiazza| first = Silvana | year = 2007 | title = Le figure retoriche | publisher = Zanichelli | location = Bologna | isbn = 978-88-08-16742-2 | pages = 350}}
* {{cite book | last = Morton| first = Stephen | year = 2003 | title = Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak | url = https://archive.org/details/gayatrichakravor00mort_058| url-access = limited| publisher = Routledge | location = London | isbn = 0-415-22934-0 | pages = [https://archive.org/details/gayatrichakravor00mort_058/page/n190 176]}}
* {{cite book | last = Smyth | first = Herbert Weir | year = 1920 | title = Greek Grammar | publisher = Harvard University Press | location = Cambridge, Massachusetts | isbn = 0-674-36250-0 | pages = 677}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Figures of speech}}

[[Category:Rhetoric]]
[[Category:Figures of speech]]