Question

Which figure of speech is used in this text?
Joy asked her mother if she could adopt a cat, and her mother replied, "It's a definite maybe," so Joy didn't want to get her hopes up.

Answer 1

This is an oxymoron — a contradictory phrase. "Definite" (certain) and "maybe" (uncertain) are opposites, so putting them together creates an oxymoronic, paradoxical expression.