Literally meaning ignorance, the term was originally used to describe the benighted condition of Arabia prior to the advent of Islam.
For locals the most popular order is vetkoek (pronounced fet-cook and literally meaning 'fat cake'): an Afrikaner pastry that's a bit like a savoury doughnut, filled with mince.
But he says the slightly unusual thing about literally is its meaning has not evolved slowly, with a slight shift, but the precise meaning has been reversed.
"But from the early 19th century it gained another meaning - to give emphasis - for example instead of literally hundreds of people meaning hundreds of people, it could have referred to 80 or 90, " he says.
But for millions of people - and most of them are women - these words have no meaning, literally.
In Germany yields have turned negative a few times for two-year debt, meaning investors are literally paying the government to borrow their money.
We discussed the difference between having a sponsor, meaning someone that literally helps move your career along and a mentor who has the roll of helping you through advising and coaching.
"The basic idea of a hyperinstrument is where the technology is built right into the instrument so that the instrument knows how it's being played literally what the expression is, what the meaning is, what the direction of the music is, " Machover says.
If you scan for the negative first, your brain literally has no resources left over to see the things you are grateful for or the meaning embedded in your work.
According to Brookes, the latter use of literally - which is especially common in an informal context - sometimes does not add anything to the meaning of a sentence.
应用推荐