metonymy

From Late Latin metonymia, from Ancient Greek μετωνυμίᾱ (metōnumíā, “change of name”), from μετά (metá, “other”) + ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”).

• (General American) IPA^(key): /mɪˈtɑnəmi/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /mɪˈtɒnəmi/
• Rhymes: -ɒnəmi

metonymy (countable and uncountable, plural metonymies)

1. (rhetoric) The use of a single characteristic or part of an object, concept or phenomenon to identify the entire object, concept, phenomenon or a related object.

   Hypernyms: trope, figure of speech

   Coordinate terms: synecdoche, metaphor, figurativeness

   • 1835, L[arret] Langley, “[The Seven Tropes.] Metonymy.”, in A Manual of the Figures of Rhetoric, […], Doncaster, South Yorkshire: […] C. White, […], →OCLC, page 7:

     Metonymy does new names impose,
     And things for things by near relation shews.

   • 1891 September, William Minto, “Practical talks on writing English”, in Theodor Flood, editor, The Chautauquan, volume 13, →OCLC, page 279:

     ...the principle of metonymy is simply to substitute for the plain name of a thing a name or phrase based on something connected with it.

   • 2015 January 16, Rick Paulas, “The Linguistics of Tragedy”, in Pacific Standard‎^[1], archived from the original on 22 April 2025:

     THE KEY CONCEPT IS “metonymy.” This is the act of a word or phrase associated with a concept coming to represent the entirety of said concept. Generally, this means an extension of the original meaning. For example, “city hall” no longer means just the structure, but also the lawmakers who inhabit that structure. In the same way, “dish” started as the physical plate a meal is served on, before people started using it to represent the meal itself.

2. (countable) A metonym.

• metonymy on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• trope (literature) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “metonymy”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.