School of Writing, Literature, and Film

In the Oregon State Guide to English Literary Terms, our professors define common literary devices and offer short lessons on how to use them in essays and other forms of literary criticism. The series is designed to be a free, online teaching resource for high school English teachers and college and high school English students, offering them tools to engage meaningfully with challenging literary texts.

To support dual language instruction, we are beginning to add Spanish as well as English subtitles to our videos. If you would like to read the English transcripts of our videos, please click on their titles and you will be directed to pages dedicated to each term. To support teachers as they transition to remote learning / distance learning platforms during the current COVID-19 crisis, we've also added a few suggestions at the end of each transcript for further thinking and reading. If you are a talented high school student who is interested in learning about fiction or poetry this summer, please consider enrolling in our ENG 104 or ENG 106 courses as a non-degree-seeking student.

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"What is Figurative Language?" (Spanish Subtitles Available)

What is a Narrator?