The word "literally" is used in the modern world far too much, and always wrongly. It's normally dropped into a sentence in an attempt to add emphasis to a description. But given that most descriptions are metaphorical in someway, it just becomes nonsense. Witness: "It was so hot, I was literally melting to death".
So much is this the case that I've been having a hard time trying to work out how to use it correctly in a sentence. Ignoring the obvious: "this French word literally means...", I guess there is two ways. Firstly, add it before a non-metaphorical description - "he was literally six foot three" - but that is dull, and pointless. The second way, I think, is to add it before a description that while is commonly understood to be a metaphor, in this instance, it is not: "the frozen lake was literally as cold as ice". There's something quite pleasing about that, but such sentences are likely to be rare.
This is really more of Alex's area. Any thoughts?
Monday, June 30, 2008
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Yeah, it gets used a lot now as an intensifier. Whereas it still most commonly means either 'word for word' (e.g. 'I translated the sentence literally') or 'not figuratively' ('I literally couldn't see my hand in front of my face'), it's now also used as an intensifier designed to convey the immediacy of an impression: 'I literally laughed my face off.' This, obviously, often runs counter to its other more (erm) literal sense.
The best example of this ever comes from the bilious rantings of dead* right-wing televangelist Jerry Falwell, who said:
'If we do not act now, homosexuals will own America! If you and I do not speak up now, this homosexual steamroller will literally crush all decent men, women, and children who get in its way.'
Millions of examples of this sort of thing at http://literally.barelyfitz.com/.
* Not at the time.
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