Answer: what is the correct way to use the word “hopefully”?
We’ve been asked “what is the correct way to use the word ‘hopefully’?” Let’s take a look at this historically controversial issue with some help from the Magnificent Seven.
Yes, there’s a bit of controversy surrounding the word hopefully and how it’s used in speaking and writing. For a long, long time (read: centuries), there was only one acceptable meaning for the word hopefully-“in a hopeful manner.” Perhaps the most-touted example of this usage is in Robert Louis Stevenson’s essay “El Dorado,” where he says “Little do ye know your own blessedness; for to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour.” The usage here gives us the sense that hope or anticipation of an event is better than the reality; it is better to travel in a hopeful manner than it is to reach one’s destination.
“It doesn’t look like snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky hopefully.
Hopefully is an adverb, and it’s modifying the way that JD is looking up at the sky. Because adverbs generally modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs in a sentence, we could also use it to modify the way he’s speaking:
“It doesn’t look like snow today,” JD said hopefully, peering up at the sky.
In both cases, JD’s action is undertaken in a hopeful manner.
So where’s the controversy? Well, the English language is a living language, which means that it’s constantly evolving. We coin new words and change the meanings of old ones through usage … and that’s what has happened to hopefully. Usage has given a different meaning to hopefully, one that is much more commonly used and understood in today’s world. Most of the time when you see hopefully in a sentence, it’s used in the sense of “it is hoped,” “I hope,” or “we hope.”
“Hopefully it won’t snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky.
This usage of hopefully is called a disjunct, which is an adverb that expresses information that may not be necessary to the sentence. In particular, using hopefully in this manner turns it into a sentence adverb, which modifies the entire sentence and conveys the attitude, mood, or sentiments of the person using it. As might be expected, purists frown on this kind of usage, since hopefully isn’t modifying anything in particular.
At the annual Associated Press Stylebook conference in 2012, the stylebook editors did at last approve the usage of hopefully in the “it is hoped/I hope/we hope” sense. Why should we care? Well, the AP Stylebook is considered the industry standard for the news industry in the United States. While it covers grammar and punctuation, it’s used not only for printed media but also for broadcasters and public relations firms. What this boils down to is that the disjunct usage of hopefully has become more common than the original usage.
It’s unlikely that a lot of grammar purists will take the time to nitpick your fic for every disjunct usage (and it’s not just hopefully that’s used as a sentence adverb, either; there are a number of others), but you can still avoid it as well as some of the confusion that can arise from using a word with two distinct meanings, as hopefully does. How? Structure the sentence differently so there’s no confusion.
“I hope it won’t snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky.
Vin snorted. “Hope all you want, kid, but we’re still gonna get another 6 inches.”
Hopefully is absent from the first sentence, but it’s still clear what JD means (even if Vin snows all over his hopes).
In the end, you can use hopefully either way-whether you mean it to describe something in a hopeful manner or to stand for it is hoped/I hope/we hope. According to the Associated Press, both are considered correct.
If you're looking for more information on adverbs, check out our adverbs tag.
Sources:
Yes, there’s a bit of controversy surrounding the word hopefully and how it’s used in speaking and writing. For a long, long time (read: centuries), there was only one acceptable meaning for the word hopefully-“in a hopeful manner.” Perhaps the most-touted example of this usage is in Robert Louis Stevenson’s essay “El Dorado,” where he says “Little do ye know your own blessedness; for to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour.” The usage here gives us the sense that hope or anticipation of an event is better than the reality; it is better to travel in a hopeful manner than it is to reach one’s destination.
“It doesn’t look like snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky hopefully.
Hopefully is an adverb, and it’s modifying the way that JD is looking up at the sky. Because adverbs generally modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs in a sentence, we could also use it to modify the way he’s speaking:
“It doesn’t look like snow today,” JD said hopefully, peering up at the sky.
In both cases, JD’s action is undertaken in a hopeful manner.
So where’s the controversy? Well, the English language is a living language, which means that it’s constantly evolving. We coin new words and change the meanings of old ones through usage … and that’s what has happened to hopefully. Usage has given a different meaning to hopefully, one that is much more commonly used and understood in today’s world. Most of the time when you see hopefully in a sentence, it’s used in the sense of “it is hoped,” “I hope,” or “we hope.”
“Hopefully it won’t snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky.
This usage of hopefully is called a disjunct, which is an adverb that expresses information that may not be necessary to the sentence. In particular, using hopefully in this manner turns it into a sentence adverb, which modifies the entire sentence and conveys the attitude, mood, or sentiments of the person using it. As might be expected, purists frown on this kind of usage, since hopefully isn’t modifying anything in particular.
At the annual Associated Press Stylebook conference in 2012, the stylebook editors did at last approve the usage of hopefully in the “it is hoped/I hope/we hope” sense. Why should we care? Well, the AP Stylebook is considered the industry standard for the news industry in the United States. While it covers grammar and punctuation, it’s used not only for printed media but also for broadcasters and public relations firms. What this boils down to is that the disjunct usage of hopefully has become more common than the original usage.
It’s unlikely that a lot of grammar purists will take the time to nitpick your fic for every disjunct usage (and it’s not just hopefully that’s used as a sentence adverb, either; there are a number of others), but you can still avoid it as well as some of the confusion that can arise from using a word with two distinct meanings, as hopefully does. How? Structure the sentence differently so there’s no confusion.
“I hope it won’t snow today,” JD said, peering up at the sky.
Vin snorted. “Hope all you want, kid, but we’re still gonna get another 6 inches.”
Hopefully is absent from the first sentence, but it’s still clear what JD means (even if Vin snows all over his hopes).
In the end, you can use hopefully either way-whether you mean it to describe something in a hopeful manner or to stand for it is hoped/I hope/we hope. According to the Associated Press, both are considered correct.
If you're looking for more information on adverbs, check out our adverbs tag.
Sources:
- The Free Dictionary
- Grammar Errors.com
- Grammar Girl here and here
- AP Changes Rules for Hopefully
- Bryson, Bill. Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words. New York: Broadway Press, 2002. (as quoted here)