《英语修辞学(第2版)》分为3个部分,共11章。第1章论述修辞学的定义及其与演讲术的相互关系。第2章介绍英语修辞学及其产生的渊源。第3章分析学习英语修辞的重要意义。第4、5章分别讨论选词和用句。第6~11章**讨论英语修辞格。其中,第6章讨论修辞格的定义、功能及其使用原则;第7章讨论音形类修辞格;第8、9章讨论句法结构类修辞格;第10章讨论语义类修辞格;第11章讨论逻辑类修辞格。为帮助读者掌握各章内容,每章之后均安排思考题或多种形式的练习题,书末安排综合测试题,并提供部分参考答案。
《英语修辞学(第2版)》为英语专业本科学生使用的教材,也可供英语修辞研究者及具备相当英语阅读能力的英语学习者学习参考。

《英语修辞学(第2版)》:
The history of rhetoric covers about 2,500 years. For most of its history, rhetoric has been closely associated with education. As learners of English, we ought to understand its broad currents and crosscurrents. We need to know about rhetoric for other reasons. First of all, it is a compelling subject to study. Of course, many of us could read, write and speak without having read Aristotle. Knowing what he said won't necessarily make us better speakers or writers. But we shouldn't feel reluctant to study rhetoric for its own sake. We can appreciate Aristotle simply because he had important things to say. Second, knowledge of rhetoric helps us understand our world. As Kenneth Burke said, all human beings practice rhetoric and come under its influence. Every day we use words to shape attitudes and encourage people to act in certain ways. In one sense, teaching represents a rhetorical art. We can also find language used "as a symbolic means of inducing cooperation" in literature, advertising, broadcast, journalism, politics, religion, art, films, and conversation. Not all communication has a rhetorical purpose, but much of what we say, hear, read, and do involves influencing somebody else to make choices. Rhetoric is a humanistic discipline which enables us to understand those choices and the processes by which we make them.
As an art of verbal communication, English rhetoric is particularly essential to students of English and to those who use English as a communicative means. English language can be considered a tremendous system, which consists of at least three subsystems:①pragmatics and rhetoric; ②semiotics; and ③semantics. English beginners should, of course, lay special emphasis on semiotics first. But when their English proficiency comes up to an intermediate level, they should devote close attention to the study of pragmatics and rhetoric. To be effective in verbal communication in English, one has to study and acquire English rhetoric.
English rhetoric is important to reading and understanding. It often happens that students of English can not puzzle out the meaning of what they read though there are neither new words nor grammatical problem. The obstacles to their understanding may be rhetoric. Hard facts show that, without knowledge of English thetoric, foreigners can hardly understand English works in the original.
Good speaking and writing depend upon rhetoric. Good speaking and writing are more than making a collection of statements worthy of belief. Because speaking is intended for the audience and writing for the reader, whose minds are different from the speaker's or writer's, the listener or reader does not make the same mental connections the speaker or writer makes; he or she does not see the world exactly as the speaker or the writer sees it. He or she is already flooded daily with thousands of statements demanding assent, which he or she knows or believes to be false, confused, or deceptive. If the speech or writing is to get through to the speaker or writer - or even to be listened to or be read and considered at all - it must be interesting, clear, persuasive, and memorable, so that the listener or reader will pay attention to, understand, believe, and remember the ideas it communicates. To meet these requirements, the speech and work must have an appropriate and clear thesis, sufficient arguments and reasons that support the thesis, a logical and progressive arrangement, and an effective style.
Learning English is for the main purpose of effective communication, which results from a good command of the language in listening, speaking, reading, writing and translation. And all of these five linguistic abilities are closely related to rhetoric. The following example will show how rhetoric works in speaking and writing.
A invites B out to dinner, but B can't make it because he has another engagement. What would B say? Here are two versions:
……

Part One
Chapter 1 What Is Rhetoric?
1.1 Rhetoric and Oratory
1.2 Connotation of Rhetoric
1.3 Definitions of Rhetoric
1.4 Five Assumptions
Exercises
Chapter 2 Brief History of Western Rhetoric
2.1 Classical Rhetoric(5th c.B.C.-A.D.5 th c.)
2.1.1 Ancient Greece and Ancient Greek Democracy
2.1.2 Sophists and Their Practices of Rhetoric
2.1.3 Ancient Greek Rhetoricians and Their Theory
2.1.4 Roman Rhetoricians and Their Theory
2.2 Rhetoric in the Middle Ages(5th-14th c.)
2.3 Rhetoric in the Renaissance(15th-16th c.)
2.4 New Classical Rhetoric(17th-19th c.)
2.4.1 The Scientific Perspective
2.4.2 The Elocutionary Perspective
2.4.3 The Literary Perspective
2.5 Contemporary Rhetoric
2.6 Conclusion
Exercises
Chapter 3The Importance of Learning English Rhetoric
Exercises

Part Two
Chapter 4 Choice of Words
4.1 Use Suitable Words
4.2 Denotation and Connotation
4.3 General Words and Specific Words
4.4 Abstract Words and Concrete Words
4.5 Short Words and Long Words
Exercises
Chapter 5 Choice of Sentences
5.1 Types of Sentences
5.1.1 Grammatical Classification
5.1.1.1 Simple Sentences
5.1.1.2 Compound Sentences
5.1.1.3 Complex Sentences
5.1.1.4 Compound-complex Sentences
5.1.2 Functional Classification
5.1.2.1 Declarative Sentences
5.1.2.2 Interrogative Sentences
5.1.2.3 Imperative Sentences
5.1.2.4 Exclamatory.Sentences
5.1.3 Rhetorical Classification
5.1.3.1 Loose Sentences
5.1.3.2 Periodic Sentences
5.1.3.3 Balanced Sentences
5.2 Long and Short Sentences
5.2.1 Short Sentences
5.2.2 Long Sentences
5.2.3 Alternating Short and Long Sentences
Exercises

Part Three
Chapter 6 Introduction:Figures of Speech
6.1 What Is a Figure of Speech
6.2 Why Are Figures of Speech Used
6.3 The Classification of Figures of Speech
6.4 Use Figures of Speech in a Right Way
Exercises
Chapter 7 Phonetic Figures of Speech
7.1 Alliteration
7.2 Assonance
7.3 Consonance
7.4 Onomatopoeia
7.5 Aposiopesis
7.6 Apostrophe
7.7 Pun
Exercises
Chapter 8 Syntactic Figures of Speech (Ⅰ)
8.1 Repetition
8.1.1 Immediate Repetition
8.1.2 Intermittent Repetition
8.2 Anaphora
8.3 Epiphora
8.4 Symploce
8.5 Anadiplosis
8.6 Parallelism
8.7 Antithesis
Exercises
Chapter 9 Syntactic Figures of Speech (Ⅱ)
9.1 Climax
9.2 Anticlimax
9.3 Syllepsis
9.4 Zeugma
9.5 Chiasmus
9.6 Asyndeton
9.7 Polysyndeton
9.8 Rhetorical question
Exercises
Chapter 10 Semantic Figures of Speech
10.1 Simile
10.2 Metaphor
10.3 Metonymy
10.4 Synecdoche
10.5 Antonomasia
10.6 Personification
10.7 Parody
10.8 Synesthesia
10.9 Transferred Epithet
Exercises
Chapter 11 Logical Figures of Speech
11.1 Allegory
11.2 Allusion
11.3 Hyperbole
11.4 Understatement
11.4.1 Litotes
11.4.2 Meiosis
11.4.3 Overtones
11.5 Irony
11.5.1 Verbal Irony
11.5.1.1 Light Irony
11.5.1.2 Heavy Irony
11.5.2 Situational Irony
11.6 Innuendo
11.7 Euphemism
11.8 Oxymoron
11.9 Analogy
11.1 0Paradox
Exercises

Appendix A A General Test on Figures of Speech
Appendix B Simplistic Definitions of Figures of Speech

Bibliography
Index