Prolepsis

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /pɹoʊˈlɛpsɪs/

Definitions

1. The use of predicting future occurrences or reactions within a text exemplifies a technique often found in storytelling
2. This rhetorical strategy entails preemptively addressing possible objections or adversities before they surface
3. The anticipation of future events or circumstances in narrative or speech to enhance understanding or persuasion

Etymology: Ancient Greek rhetoricians used "prolepsis" for a specific trick: raising and answering an objection before your opponent can make it. The Greek "prólēpsis" meant "preconception" or "anticipation," built from "pro-" (before) and "lambánō" (take), so the literal sense is "taking beforehand." That is the root of the modern meaning, though the rhetorical sense came first and remained the technical one for centuries. English took the word directly from Latin "prolepsis," which had itself borrowed it from Greek. In its rhetorical sense it has long been used in grammar and literary criticism too, where it can name a figure of speech that treats something as already true or already happening before it is. The everyday sense of anticipating future events is a later extension, and it is the one most readers meet today.