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Julielai Posted 21 years ago
Vocabulary

"The word 'hopefully' has become the litmus test...



"The word 'hopefully' has become the litmus test to determine whether one is a language snob or a language slob" William Safire.
How does the word "hopefully" become the litmus test? Hopefully, I'm not a language slob...(will my studied avoidance of the word make me a language snob?)

Emotion: tongue tied
  

Top answer

Dear Julielai, It is an interesting question. It is perhaps because the writer does not believe that one may say «hopefully» for «it is to be hoped that». Therefore to say «hopefully» is to be a slob.

— Goldmund

  • Dear Julielai, It is an interesting question.
  • It is perhaps because the writer does not believe that one may say «hopefully» for «it is to be hoped that».
  • Therefore to say «hopefully» is to be a slob.
  • Kindest regards, Goldmund
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3 Answers
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Dear Julielai,

It is an interesting question. It is perhaps because the writer does not believe that one may say «hopefully» for «it is to be hoped that». Therefore to say «hopefully» is to be a slob.

Kindest regards,
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I had not idea 'hopefully' would be a problem using...
I've found interesting notes about its use in my dictionary...

hopefully
• In sense 2, hopefully is called a 'sentence adverb', because it qualifies the whole sentence and not just one word or phrase in it o Hopefully, it was all over now and he'd be able to take a spot of leave. There are many sentence
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Thanks, Goldmund and Waiti!
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