Literally . . . Overused

I am not literally sick to death of the misuse of these words. Why? Because if I were, I’d be dead. Why? Because the presence of the adverbial form of “literal” in this paragraph’s first sentence tells you . . . . oh, you may be literally tired of this, but . . . I continue: The presence of “literally” means (and, of course, I’m tempted to say it “literally” means) that what follows in the sentence happened just as the words indicated, i.e., in reality, actually, factually. “My head literally exploded when Rosie played 30 minutes of Justin Bieber last night while I was doing math,” means that . . . you’re dead and your math book is a mess.

(Tina sometimes, but never literally, talks trash.)


Yes, yes, yes the overuse of the misused “literal” is not a revelatory observation. Others are fighting the good fight on this front. See here and here. And, yes, I know that the abusers of the word don’t mean me to believe that whatever follows “literally” literally happened. People are speaking figuratively, of course. But is that the end of it? Is that really an adequate defense for “I literally coughed my lungs up” and “I literally cried my eyes out” and “_____(your favorite here)______________”?

Can’t we also recommend that we literally give the figurative “literally” a rest? That would be awesome.