‘Literally’ As a Figure of Speech

In a really excelent post about language and how frustrating and cliche’ some people express themselves, I was reminded of my own ‘literal’ encounter one night out at Amber Room. I would be interested to hear responses from a good many teenagers who would find themselves placed upon the critical chopping block.

Awful as I am with my friends and loved ones about their choice of verbage (a word, in itself, I’m finding grossly over and mis-used in my office of late), I tend not to jump down the throats of people who weren’t even talking to me in the first place. But the word “literally” always makes me cringe.

Then there was this asshole, one guy, speaking in a tone of such lilt and shrill, brain-rattling pitch that I felt warranted in my intrusion. It didn’t help that I was on my own in a crowded bar, waiting for a friend, and especially susceptable to eaves dropping.

He was speaking to his friend to his friend, next to whom I was standing, all three of us leaning, respectively, up against the bar with drinks and smokes in hand, “No no, seriously, it literally blew my mind, it was that good. I mean, seriously, you have to check this album out…mind, literally blown.”

It was that he had emphasized its literal nature that blew my own mind (figuratively). I mean, he said it twice! He made sure that his friend understood that he was not misusing the term here; he really, really meant that his mind had been blown. Despite evidence to the contrary, his mind seeming to be in tact, this point was irrebutable.

“I’m sorry,” I said, hoping to at least slide my asshole self gently into the conversation before jamming down critique, “but I believe you mean ‘figuratively.’”

“What?” he said.

“Well, you said it ‘literally’ blew your mind. I’m sure you just meant it for emphasis and all, but you seemed pretty adamant. I mean, you made a whole point of the thing again, that it was ‘literally’ blown.”

“What’s your deal?”

“No no, no deal. It’s just that, at best, assuming this album was really all that amazing, your mind was ‘figuratively’ blown. Maybe we’re having a ‘mind blowing’ misunderstanding here, different definitions and all of what it means to ‘blow the mind.’”

“You’re an asshole.”

“Yes, no arguing that. But I get how easy it is to say ‘literally’ when you mean ‘figuratively.’ It’s a much prettier word, if nothing else, just sort of rolls down the tongue, and it really does seem to add some element of ligitimacy to whatever silly assertion you’ve just made, even if you’re not sure why. Maybe you could still use it? Why don’t you say that your mind was “Literally figuratively blown.”

“I don’t think we were talking to you.”

“Right, sure, but let’s just look at this; I think you could get away with saying that your mind was literally figuratively blown away. That would be true enough. You would just be distinguising your literal use of ‘figuratively blown’ from an entirely figurative use of ‘figuratively blown.’ Because I suppose one could be figuratively speaking about one’s mind being figuratively blown, assuming we allow that one’s mind can be literally blown away in the first place. I think what we end up with here is saying that, when you listened to the album, it was actually, metaphorically blown. Which is now distinct from the whole ‘figurative, figurative’ mess, which, I think sort of works like a double negative, and would mean that you were dead from a shotgun wound.”

“Go away,” he finally said, and turned back towards his friend who now had their drinks in hand, his eyes searching for somewhere else to talk.

“Then again,” I called out, my own tone now as shrill as his had been in the first place, “if you still really want to say ‘literally blew my mind’ cause it sounds better, I suppose so long as you said, “…it figuratively literally blew my mind” that might work too. All a bit unnecessary, don’t you suppose?” But of course, they never heard this last bit of suggestion.

Maybe this asshole took things a bit too far, literally speaking.

Here’s a few other people tracking the word’s misuse:
slate.com
This excellent site literally tracks the abuse of the word