{"id":1032,"date":"2014-10-30T11:38:27","date_gmt":"2014-10-30T10:38:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/?p=1032"},"modified":"2014-10-24T11:42:03","modified_gmt":"2014-10-24T10:42:03","slug":"using-literally-metaphorically-is-literally-spreading-like-wildfire-the-guardian-24-10-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/?p=1032","title":{"rendered":"Using \u2018literally\u2019 metaphorically is literally spreading like wildfire (The Guardian 24-10-2014)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article-header\">\n<div id=\"main-article-info\">\n<div id=\"stand-first\" class=\"stand-first-alone\" data-component=\"Article:standfirst_cta\">Mark Twain, F Scott Fitzgerald and James Joyce all did it. (HW Fowler disapproved.) Should \u2018literally\u2019 be used to mean its opposite?<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<ul id=\"content-actions\" class=\"share-links trackable-component\" data-component=\"Article:top share tools\">\n<li class=\"full-line facebook\"><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<div id=\"content\">\n<div id=\"article-wrapper\" class=\"trackable-component\" data-component=\"Article:in body link\">\n<div id=\"article-body-blocks\">\n<div class=\"flexible-content\">\n<div id=\"mainblock\" class=\"block\" data-id=\"e1e70cf4-0269-44df-85af-9074c1d58c1a\">\n<div class=\"block-elements\">\n<figure class=\"element element-image\" data-media-id=\"gu-fc-07e36a7a-d98d-49d1-91e8-1ec93e1cfd60\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"gu-image\" src=\"http:\/\/static.guim.co.uk\/sys-images\/Guardian\/Pix\/pictures\/2014\/10\/23\/1414080509653\/James-Joyce-009.jpg\" alt=\"James Joyce\" width=\"460\" height=\"276\" \/><figcaption><span class=\"element-image__caption\">If James Joyce used &#8216;literally&#8217; metaphorically, why can&#8217;t a football writer say &#8216;Liverpool literally came back from the dead&#8217;? Photograph: Fran Caffrey\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"flexible-content-body\" data-display-hint=\"\">\n<p>I remember it like it was literally yesterday. I was sitting on a bench in Central Park nearly four years ago when my ears literally perked up at the egregious and altogether jarring utterance that literally hurt to hear: the misuse of the word \u201cliterally\u201d. In this case, the culprits were two high school girls, going on about being \u201cliterally soaked from head to toe\u201d by the (light) rainfall that afternoon. I didn\u2019t understand. What did they mean? They were barely wet! What could possibly compel someone to use a word to mean its opposite?<\/p>\n<p>As it turns out, this language misuse has become an all too common trend within modern-day American and British English vernacular. We have grown accustomed to using the word \u201cliterally\u201d when we mean \u201cfiguratively\u201d, lobbying for added effect while abandoning the precise and strict meaning of the one word whose use is constrained to precise and strict meaning. And we\u2019re doing so at a dangerously fast pace: since 2005, Google searches for \u201cliterally\u201d have more than <a title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/trends\/explore#q=literally\">quadrupled<\/a>, suggesting both a public acceptance of the term however it\u2019s used and a general curiosity about its use (leading search terms include \u201cliterally + meaning\u201d, \u201cdefinition + literally\u201d, and \u201cliterally + means\u201d). We have also seen references to \u201cliterally\u201d in books nearly <a title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/books.google.com\/ngrams\/graph?content=literally&amp;year_start=1700&amp;year_end=2000&amp;corpus=15&amp;smoothing=10&amp;share=&amp;direct_url=t1%3B%2Cliterally%3B%2Cc0\">triple<\/a> since 1700.<\/p>\n<p>Masked as hyperbole, the misuse of this term should probably not surprise language purists as much as it does. As the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) editor at large Jesse Sheidlower <a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.slate.com\/articles\/life\/the_good_word\/2005\/11\/the_word_we_love_to_hate.single.html\">pointed out<\/a> last year, \u201cliterally\u201d has been used in a contradictory way for centuries by some of the most famous and well respected authors. Mark Twain described Tom Sawyer as \u201cliterally rolling in wealth\u201d. F Scott Fitzgerald remarked that Jay Gatsby \u201cliterally glowed\u201d. James Joyce wrote about a Mozart piece as \u201cliterally knocking everything else into a cocked hat\u201d. As Sheidlower notes, authors\u2019 use of \u201cliterally\u201d to mean its opposite was actually quite popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, extending to other writers such as Jane Austen, Charles Dickens and Henry David Thoreau. This trend prompted a cautionary denunciation by lexicographer HW Fowler in 1926, who complained: \u201cWe have come to such a pass with this emphasiser that &#8230; we do not hesitate to insert the very word that we ought to be at pains to repudiate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Over time, we\u2019ve seen words take on opposite meanings for a range of reasons (they even have a name: auto-antonyms or contranyms). For instance, <a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.etymonline.com\/index.php?term=symposium\">\u201csymposium\u201d<\/a> used to mean a drinking party, <a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/books.google.co.uk\/books?id=XvSAl4Ng8SYC&amp;pg=PT221&amp;lpg=PT221&amp;dq=egregious+used+to+mean+remarkably+good&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=YcLHupP4ME&amp;sig=FUm5XABRq-MAWV2FNXi4w-BqXHU&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ei=yq_pUY72Kof-iQKUkoDgCg&amp;redir_esc=y#v=onepage&amp;q=egregious%20used%20to%20mean%20remarkably%20good&amp;f=false\">\u201cegregious\u201d<\/a> used to mean remarkably good and <a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/books.google.co.uk\/books?id=QQovEeLHVl0C&amp;pg=PT151&amp;lpg=PT151&amp;dq=%E2%80%9Cman+of+good+cheer%E2%80%9D+harlot&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=ZClputwvjM&amp;sig=CxXeAQULF85dNiXKZVtTtAvd224&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ei=-NybT6XnI8LY2AXO5NnhDg&amp;redir_esc=y#v=onepage&amp;q=%E2%80%9Cman%20of%20good%20cheer%E2%80%9D%20harlot&amp;f=false\">\u201charlot\u201d<\/a> used to mean a man of good cheer. Some words have even retained their contradictory meanings, like \u201csanction\u201d (meaning both to permit and to punish) and \u201coversight\u201d (meaning both supervision and not noticing something). Similarly, we know that younger generations often twist words\u2019 meanings for colloquial purposes. Words like \u201csick\u201d and \u201cill\u201d are used positively to connote talent and coolness, quite distinct from their traditional meanings of poor health. Same with \u201cwicked,\u201d \u201cgnarly,\u201d \u201cdope\u201d and countless others. Whatever the cause for this language (d)evolution, \u201cliterally\u201d is the next victim, and arguably the most significant.<\/p>\n<p>Defenders of this misspeak are quick to point to the dictionary for vindication, and they\u2019re right. In September 2011, the OED added the\u00a0<a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.oed.com\/view\/Entry\/109061?redirectedFrom=literally\">opposite meaning<\/a> of \u201cliterally\u201d, seemingly arming misusers with the credibility needed to shoot down any criticisms of their word crime. But such an inclusion should not be mistaken. Dictionaries are merely reflections of language, intended to capture words that reach a critical mass of usage by the population. The OED describes its purpose as the following: \u201cThe Oxford English Dictionary is not an arbiter of proper usage, despite its widespread reputation to the contrary \u2026 Its content should be viewed as an objective reflection of English language usage, not a subjective collection of usage \u2018dos\u2019 and \u2018don\u2019ts\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"element element-image\" data-media-id=\"fa001abcccb6dae2b891532ce501ae953b18b7ab\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"gu-image\" src=\"http:\/\/static.guim.co.uk\/sys-images\/Guardian\/Pix\/pictures\/2014\/10\/23\/1414082225613\/303cb07b-1987-4ecb-9c39-dc774b633702-460x276.jpeg\" alt=\"Looking to dictionaries for vindication may backfire\" width=\"460\" height=\"276\" \/><figcaption><span class=\"element-image__caption\">Looking to dictionaries for vindication may backfire: they reflect usage rather than making subjective judgments.<\/span> <span class=\"element-image__credit\">Photograph: Alamy<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The OED\u2019s caveat reveals two important facts: one, that a word defined one way in the dictionary does not necessarily constitute its proper use; and two, that words\u2019 meanings evolve in a kind of human (versus natural) selection, ostensibly with no ultimate or fixed definition (as with \u201csanction\u201d and \u201coversight\u201d). The challenge with the latter, however, is that certain words do have unequivocally fixed associations \u2013 like numbers, colours and directions. For instance, if \u201cfive\u201d became \u201cfour,\u201d \u201cblack\u201d became \u201cwhite\u201d and \u201cup\u201d became \u201cdown,\u201d we could no longer describe the basic makeup of our hands, or how a kettle appears, or where to turn to look at a bird. We would lose the values bound to each word, thereby stripping them of the mutually accepted associations we need to communicate and risking linguistic anarchy.<\/p>\n<p>So where does this revelation leave us with the definition of \u201cliterally\u201d? For most, it won\u2019t change anything. People will continue to be \u201cliterally soaked from head to toe\u201d for generations, regardless of age, education level and of course whether or not they are indeed saturated with water from the upper-most part of their body to the bottom-most. But what results from forsaking the exact meaning of the word that means \u201cexact meaning\u201d remains to be seen. Civilisation could go on just fine despite the confusion, or we could find that \u201cliterally\u201d was the (figurative) fulcrum holding up the institutional pillars of language, its misuse crumbling our most important social construct.<\/p>\n<p><em>Adam Lewis is a writer based in New York City. He focuses on global efforts to eradicate poverty, disease and the general mistreatment of people and words. You can follow him on Twitter at <\/em><a title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lewisam10\"><em>@Lewisam10<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mark Twain, F Scott Fitzgerald and James Joyce all did it. (HW Fowler disapproved.) Should \u2018literally\u2019 be used to mean its opposite?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1033,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9,2,13,56],"tags":[157,158],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesusromerotrillo.es\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}