D is for Diaphora
Oh so simple, yet open to a world of possibility. Diaphora. (di A pho ra)
This figure is a form of ploce, which is repetition of a single word. (Neatly enough, ploce is Greek for "plaiting," which gives some indication of how the figure operates to weave ideas together.
As a specific form of ploce, diaphora is a scheme involving "repetition of a common word rather than a proper name" in order to perform two logical functions. Lanham tells us "it signifies qualities of, as well as names, the person," though this definition is too narrow to encompass all that would be considered diaphora.
Some examples from the excellent Silva Rhetoricae.
"The president is not the president when he compromises his morals and our trust so basely."
(I make no excuses for how apropos this may or may not be.)
"Boys will be boys."
These are both perfect examples to show the range of function diaphora performs as a figure. Both are exact repetition, yet the first uses perfect repetition to reveal the imperfections of the individual identified with the first "president." It's essentially an argument by contrast that's illuminated by comparison. It's as though the unfitness - there's a figure called coinage - is revealed when the fitness is forced. The second example uses perfect repetition to argue, essentially, for the fitness of the first boys within the parameters of boy-ness. It's an argument from similarity: "these actions are to be expected because the agents - boys - are operating within the realm of action expected from boys. In recent weeks, as we've heard a rising cry in the media to address sexual assault and the under-rugging (another coinage) of male violence, this figure has appeared in a modified form: "Boys will be held accountable for their actions." In disrupting the platitude and easy balance of the figure as we know it, the modified version demonstrates how the diaphora obscures, in its tight plaiting and symmetry, the dismissive and unaccountable undertones of "Boys will be boys."
Perhaps etymology is the place to conclude. Where ploce means "plaiting," diaphora is Greek for "dislocation, difference, disagreement." What a good, base-level illustration of the difference between how figures may appear similar on their surface, yet have paradoxical function. These are figures that make full use of the "resources of ambiguity" Kenneth Burke talks about, for at once we can have ploce operating on the plane of similarity while diaphora functions to dislocate and differentiate, using similarity to disguise (sneaky sneaky) meanings that may be att
