Tuesday 6 November 2012

Literally Studies: I DON'T UNDERSTAND THIS

One of my pet peeves is people using 'literally' wrong. People so often use it as an amplifier and accidentally end up using it to mean its exact opposite, 'figuratively', which drives me crazy. BUT I cannot work this one out at all. 


It's an advert for 4G, which as far as I can work out is exactly the same as 3G. It says "The waiting is over. Literally."

Um... okay. That is technically correct. The waiting IS literally over. BUT, as a snappy punchline on an advert, I can't make it make any sense, because there's no way that this sentence could be not literal. It shouldn't say LITERALLY because "The waiting is over" can't be... figurative. 'Literally' is meaningless in this sentence. It serves no function except to sound impressive. "The waiting is over. METAPHORICALLY." "The waiting is over. ALLEGORICALLY." Those are nonsense.

Am I missing something here? WHAT IS UP WITH THIS ADVERT? WHO THOUGHT THIS MADE A GOOD SLOGAN? WHY DON'T PEOPLE UNDERSTAND WORDS?

Erk. My brain hurts.


#GOBAMA

No comments:

Post a Comment