Apophasis

Not to be confused with Apophysis (disambiguation), Apoptosis, or Apophis (disambiguation).

Apophasis is a rhetorical device wherein the speaker or writer brings up a subject by either denying it, or denying that it should be brought up. Accordingly, it can be seen as a rhetorical relative of irony. Apophasis is usually employed to make a subversive ad hominem attack, which makes it a frequently used tactic in political speeches to make an attack on one's opponent.

The device is also called paralipsis (παράλειψις) – also spelled paraleipsis or paralepsis – or occupatio, and known also as praeteritio, preterition, antiphrasis (ἀντίφρασις), or parasiopesis (παρασιώπησις).

Name

The word is Late Latin, from Greek ἀπόφασις from ἀπόφημι apophemi, "to say no".

Usage

Apophasis was often used by Cicero in his orations. In his "Pro Caelio" speech, he said "Obliviscor iam iniurias tuas, Clodia, depono memoriam doloris mei" ("I now forget your wrongs, Clodia, I set aside the memory of my pain [that you caused].")

As a rhetorical device, it can serve various purposes, often dependent on the relationship of the speaker to the addressee and the extent of their shared knowledge. Apophasis is rarely literal; instead, it conveys meaning through implications that may depend on this context. As an example of how meaning shifts, the English phrase "needless to say" invokes shared understanding, but its actual meaning depends on whether that understanding was really shared. The speaker is alleging that it is not necessary to say something because the addressee already knows it, but is it so? If it is, it may merely emphasize a pertinent fact. If the knowledge is weighted with history, it may be an indirect way of levying an accusation ("needless to say, because you are responsible"). If the addressee does not actually already possess the knowledge, it may be a way to condescend: the speaker suspected as much but wanted to call attention to the addressee's ignorance. Conversely, it could be a sincere and polite way to share necessary information that the addressee may or may not know without implying that the addressee is ignorant.

Proslepsis

When apophasis is taken to its extreme, proslepsis occurs, and the speaker provides full details, stating or drawing attention to something in the very act of pretending to pass it over: "I will not stoop to mentioning the occasion last winter when our esteemed opponent was found asleep in an alleyway with an empty bottle of vodka still pressed to his lips."

Examples

Political

In 1988, President Ronald Reagan said of Michael Dukakis, a presidential candidate who was rumored to have received psychological treatment, "Look, I'm not going to pick on an invalid."

The Huffington Post noted Donald Trump's repeated use of apophasis during his 2016 presidential campaign. In 2015, he said of fellow Republican presidential candidate and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, "I promised I would not say that she ran Hewlett-Packard into the ground, that she laid off tens of thousands of people and she got viciously fired. I said I will not say it, so I will not say it." In 2016, he Trump tweeted about journalist Megyn Kelly, saying “I refuse to call Megyn Kelly a bimbo, because that would not be politically correct." In 2016, he said of opponent Hillary Clinton, "I will never say this, but she screams and drives me crazy."

Fictional

From Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose, "I doe not say that thou receaved brybes of thy fellowes, I busie myself not in this thing...."

See also

3

References

• Smyth, Herbert Weir (1984) [1920]. Greek Grammar. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. 680. ISBN 0-674-36250-0.

External links

• Figures of rhetoric: Apophasis
• A Handbook of Rhetorical Devices: Apophasis
• Wordsmith: Paralipsis