Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun An abrupt change within a sentence to a second construction inconsistent with the first, sometimes used for rhetorical effect; for example, I warned him that if he continues to drink, what will become of him?
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In grammar and rhetoric, an instance of anacoluthia; a construction characterized by a want of grammatical sequence.
- noun Also spelled
anakoluthon and anakolouthon.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Gram.) A lack of grammatical sequence or coherence in a sentence; an instance of a change of construction in a sentence so that the latter part does not syntactically correspond with the first part.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun grammar A sentence or clause that is grammatically inconsistent, especially with respect to the type of clausal or phrasal complement for the initial clause.
- noun rhetoric Intentional use of such a structure.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun an abrupt change within a sentence from one syntactic structure to another
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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She employed, not from any refinement of style, but in order to correct her imprudences, abrupt breaches of syntax not unlike that figure which the grammarians call anacoluthon or some such name.
The Captive 2003
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So, Mr. Crystal, basically speaking, anacoluthon is not a deviation from the norm - it's more like the omition of the bulky content of the sentence, which is understandable from the context, something like subtle implication.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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Presupposition doesn't enter into the definition of anacoluthon.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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What we have is technically described as an anacoluthon, defined eg by the OED as 'a construction lacking grammatical sequence'.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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If you want to put it in terms of deviations and norms, then anacoluthon is more like the deviant conflation of two syntactic norms, or the interference of one syntactic norm by another.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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You can have cases of anacoluthon which retain the entire semantic content of the target sentences because only grammatical elements have been affected.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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We've talked about anacoluthon before, in this blog, and here's another instance.
Archive 2009-08-01 DC 2009
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There are usual several ways of resolving an anacoluthon, and yours is another - but there'd have to be a semi-colon or something beforehand, to avoid a reading miscue.
On anacolutha DC 2009
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What we have is technically described as an anacoluthon, defined eg by the OED as 'a construction lacking grammatical sequence'.
Archive 2009-02-01 DC 2009
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Now you point it out, it does read like the sort of rethink that would go on in speech I've talked about this before on the blog, in relation to anacoluthon.
cryptofascistbbq commented on the word anacoluthon
Had ye been there — for what could that have done? (John Milton in Lycidas)
August 4, 2009
jmjarmstrong commented on the word anacoluthon
JM wants to be a skilled anacoluthon practitioner so that all the world shall -- I will do such things,what they are, yet I know not.
May 26, 2010