KYJoe: an Appalachian Thespian

2006-May-9 - Literally is being used literally way too much

Let me take a moment away from moping about my present Showbiz malaise but not doing anything about it, to point the finger at most of y'all.

There is figuratively an epidemic sweeping through the collective colloquial conscience of America (maybe other predominantly English speaking countries as well- God forbid- I don't know). Intelligent people have fallen prey to it, non-intelligent people use it to sound intelligent, and non-natives are being taught by us natives the completely wrong meaning of it. What is It? The word: literally.

Everytime someone uses the word anymore it's reminiscent of cracked and bleeding fingernails on dirty chalkboards (now that's a visual and an... audial?). Am I the only one out there who feels this way? Should I be worrying about more pressing issues? Are "yes" and "yes" the answer to these questions?

Let me provide some examples of the indulgent use of this word:
The other day someone told me that a person or dog or whatever was "hot on his heels... literally." For another creature to literally be "hot on one's heels", said creature would have to be (a) really hot and (b) actually adhereing directly to the person's heels.

Recently my friend told me he "literally woke up and grabbed a beer." If he'd told me that he "woke up this morning and got himself a beer", I think I would have understood what he meant- he has a problem . There's no other way to grab a beer, than to literally grab one. Now I understand in this case my friend, who is quite intelligent, was using the word for emphasis. Think of another way do it, man! For example: "The instant I got up I grabbed myself a cold one."

People, you gotta knock it off! Sometimes I think individuals are trying to use the word as many times as possible when conversing with me because they're in cahootz or something (like the cops saying "meow" in Super Troopers).

My advice: Try and ween yourself off the word. Tape yourself during a shootin the shit type conversation. If you use it 5 times (someone I was talking to honestly did this in a span of 2 minutes! -I needed gauze to stop the blood rushing from my ears), try 4 the next time you chat with somebody.

If we all work together we can defeat the Dark Lord Literally and loosen his grip around our collective vocal chords (I meant that figuratively).

By the way, check out this site -these folks agree with me.