A Note on When Literally is Figuratively

JF Ptak Science Books   Post 2263

[My thanks to Patti Digh for finding the article that started this small exploration.]

In the new world of words that is Webster's dictionary, we find “literally” meaning something less that it has never meant since the beginning of Webster's in 1828. Evidently the new definition is made to accommodate the slanging/slangy use of this fine word in magazines and television, and especially not-good television. 

I don't see the need for screwing this word up, particularly when it comes to mean something completely different, just to pacify a current and goofy usage. Not having see the new Websters, I quote Dana Coleman, from Salon Magazine online, in the article that may be titled “According to the dictionary, “literally” now also means “figuratively”)” on the new definitions of “literally”: “In the first definition of the word,“in a literal sense or matter; actually. Its second definition is, “in effect; virtually.”

"Virtually" is not "literally", which is very weird, because Webster's is messing around with something that defines the 'is-ness" of language, a word that tells us precisely that something that is supposed to be something actually is that something, though now they tell us that "is" = "maybe".  

It is just a bad practice. Literally (old sense). I doubt that the OED will follow in these footsteps, unless Webster's changes the meaning of "follow" to include things that don't follow.  

According to Webster's 1963, virtual/virtually means “being in essence or effect, not in fact”, which rides in the face of 180-odd years of “literally”.  In the Oxford English Dictionary we find "virtually" defined so: 'With regard to essence, potentiality, or effect, as distinguished from actual form or specific manner; as far as essential qualities or facts are concerned." And so:  "In effect, although not according to strict definition; to all intents and purposes; as good as; practically. Later freq. in weakened use: nearly, almost."

 

“Literally” in Webster's dictionaries, 1828, 1886, 1913, 1919, and 1963.

• 1828. Literally: a. [Fr. from L. litera, a letter.] According to the letter ; primitive; real not figurative or metaphorical ; as the literal meaning of a phrase. 
• 1886. Literally: According to the primary and natural import of words; not figuratively.
• 1913. Literally: 1. According to the primary and natural import of words; not figuratively; as, a man and his wife can not be literally one flesh. 2. With close adherence to words; word by word. So wild and ungovernable a poet can not be translated literally. Dryden.
• 1919. Literally: adj. consisting of, or expressed by, letters; following the exact words; exact; plain. 
• 1963. Literally: “Adhering to fact; characterized mainly with concern for facts

And then off to the Oxford English Dictionary, where we see the earliest usages in the 15th century--on the other hand according to word-usage-in-Shakespeare sites, the Bard never used it.  "Literally: In a literal, exact, or actual sense; not figuratively, allegorically, etc."

c1429   Mirour Mans Saluacioune (1986) l. 553   Litteraly haf ȝe herde this dreme and what it ment.

1494   tr. W. Hilton's Scala Perfeccionis (de Worde) ii. xliii. sig. rv,   Whan Ihesu is mayster it is expowned and declared litterally, morally, mystily, & heuenly yf the mater suffre it.

1533   J. Frith Bk. answeringe Mores Let. sig. Dii,   Allthough it were Literallye fulfillyd in the Childern of Israell..yet was it also mente and veryfyed in Chryst hym selfe.

1579   W. Fulke Heskins Parl. Repealed in D. Heskins Ouerthrowne 105   They interprete literally, which the doctors did write figuratively.

1612   T. Taylor Αρχὴν Ἁπάντων: Comm. Epist. Paul to Titus i. 6   He expoundeth the same precept necessarily to be meant litterally.

1664   H. More Apol. in Modest Enq. Myst. Iniquity 481   All those Passages are not to be Literally understood.

1719   D. Defoe Farther Adventures Robinson Crusoe 311   This was a China-Ware-house indeed, truly and literally to be call'd so.

1783   Ld. Hailes Disquis. Antiq. Christian Church iv. 78 (note) ,   It may be doubted, whether this was ever literally true.

1876   E. Mellor Priesthood iv. 161   Literally speaking, ‘this cup’ could never be ‘a new covenant’.

1895   Sir A. Kekewich in Law Times Rep. 73 663/1   It is found that the Act does not mean literally what it says.

1938   Lancet 26 Nov. 1229/2   Osteosclerosis literally means a hardening of bone, but the term is generally used..to signify bone which casts a dense shadow in a radiogram.

1973   H. Brodkey in New Yorker 17 Sept. 68/2   She often became very angry with me for taking her literally.

2002   M. Desai Marx's Revenge (2004) x. 169   The expression ‘class warfare’ was meant analogically, not literally, by Marx and Engels.

Comments

[Ray Girvan]

The story's a lot more complicated. See Language Log - Literally: a history ( http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002611.html ) which is citing the OED editor Jesse Sheidlower's article The Word We Love To Hate ( http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2005/11/the_word_we_love_to_hate.html ).

Their thrust is that the use of "literally" to mean virtually/figuratively is actually about 250 years old, and long co-existed with "literally" = not figuratively. What's new is not its use to mean "figuratively", but the complaint that to do so is wrong.

George Colman and David Garrick, The Clandestine Marriage (1766)
---I am literally---the humblest / of your servants.

Frances Brooke, The History of Emily Montague, Vol. IV (1769)
He is a fortunate man to be introduced to such a party of fine women at his arrival; it is literally to feed among the lilies.

[John F. Ptak]

Thanks, Ray; now I think I know a little less about a lot more than when I started. I'll have a look at this. Thanks!