Metonymy ( /mɨˈtɒnɨmi/ mi-TONN-ə-mee) is a figure of speech used in rhetoric in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept. Metonyms can be either real or fictional concepts representing other concepts real or fictional, but they must serve as an effective and widely understood second name for what they represent.

For instance, "Hollywood" is used as a metonym (an instance of metonymy) for U.S. cinema, because of the fame and cultural identity of Hollywood, a district of the city of Los Angeles, California as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars. Another example is "Westminster," which is used as a metonym for the Parliament of the United Kingdom, because it is located there. A third example showing a different version of metonymy is the fictional character Scrooge McDuck's "money bin" or indeed Scrooge himself, often used in Disney works and parody works as metonymous with wealth - most currency in the modern era is now stored electronically, but the money bin is still drawn in comics and persists as a pop culture metonym for any financial holding of great value.