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I was interested to read the
following CNN post recently, saying how dictionaries are defining the
word literally with its most current meaning rather than its traditional
meaning. Thus literally is now used as an intensifier, meaning very
or really, rather than meaning, well, literally. That means that
you can now say, There were literally hundreds of choices on the menu,
when in fact there were about forty choices. All you are doing is implying that
there was a lot of choice. Usage changes, and dictionaries reflect current
usage, though larger dictionaries always include original uses too. Of course,
dictionaries always try to show the latest uses of words, though purists often
object.
Many words are not used literally,
though. I loved the CNN comment that "next thing they'll be telling us that there's no ham in hamburger, no egg in eggplant, a boxing ring isn't round and tennis shoes aren't just for tennis". This reminds me of Ogden Nash's poem on the hamburger (also known as a beefburger, particularly in the UK):
In mortal combat I am joined
With monstrous words wherever coined.
"Beefburger" is a term worth hating,
Both fraudulent and infuriating,
Contrived to foster the belief
That only beefburgers are made of beef,
Implying with shoddy flim and flam
That hamburgers are made of ham.
We have so many words in English
that are not literally what they claim to be, or which have changed from their
original spelling. Did you know that a newt, for example, used to be an
ewte, but assimilated the n from the indefinite article? The same is
true of an apron, which was originally a napron, and an umpire,
which used to be a numpire. This process is called ‘metanalysis’, and
you can read more about it in Stephen Ullmann’s fascinating book Semantics:
An introduction to the science of meaning.
Other words may be ambiguous,
depending on the variety of English you are using. For example, the verb to
flog is used colloquially to mean to sell in the UK, but both to
sell and to steal in Australia. Likewise, to barrack a
team in the UK means to shout abuse, while in Australia to barrack for means to
shout encouragement. As with ‘literally’, the word has come to change its
meaning. There is obviously potential for confusion there!
When you think you are using a word
to say one thing, but you are actually saying something else, that word is
called a ‘false friend’. This was brought home to me when I lived in Portugal,
where the word marmelada refers to a kind of quince jam. For me, as an
English person, marmalade was always made from citrus fruit, and often
had a bitter taste. Our local supermarket didn’t know this, though, and they
ordered several boxes of what turned out to be English orange marmalade. No one
bought it except for my family, so the price went down and down and we ate
marmalade for months. Paddington would have been happy!
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| www.paddingtonbear.com |
All this goes to show that language
develops constantly, from one country to another, from one variety to another,
and from one year to another. Online dictionaries try to reflect these changes
and are a great place for learners of a language to check current usage.
However, there are always new things that we can watch out for, and it's fascinating
to see how words change their meaning.
That’s why I literally love language!
That’s why I literally love language!
