I'm looking for a word kind-of like synecdoche but without the literary-device meaning. It designates something as being representative of a whole. I'm almost sure I picked this up in a David Foster Wallace essay.

The word would describe Kanye West representing American egotism as a whole, for instance.

I'm looking for a word similar to synecdoche, but without the literary-device meaning. It designates something as being representative of a whole. I believe I picked this up in a David Foster Wallace essay.

The word would be used, for example, to describe Kanye West as representing American egotism as a whole.