Almost
CaroGirl said:
“Almost exactly” sounds wrong to me too. Exactly doesn’t take a qualifier; it means what it means. The person in this case means “almost”, not “exactly”. Something is either exactly something else, or it isn’t.
It’s like qualifying “unique”. Nothing is “very unique”, that’s meaningless.
I think you're still talking grammar. Grammar is a good thing, but should never have the final say. The person means what he says. He means "almost exactly." "Almost an exact match," "Almost" alone is simply not close enough to get the point across. It can mean darned near any amount of time. Exactly alone doesn't cut it, either.
"Almost" is an emphasis on how very close something is without being exact. I think it's a good emphasis.
Exactly takes a qualifier if you give it one, and most pepole are going to give it one because it works. The person does not mean almost, and does not mean exactly, he means "almost exactly."
[size=-1]Dominique Bouhours said: "
Money is a good servant, but a poor master."
The same is true of grammar. Know the rules, yes, but never let them be the master, and never judge the worth of a phrase because it does or doesn't follow the rules. As writers, we always have to be the master, and grammar must always be the servant.
Phrases are good or bad solely on how well they say what they say, not because they follow or violate teh rules of grammar. Andd phrases become popular because they communicate something to people in a way that works. "Almost exactly" is an extremely common phrase because to most people, it does work well.
"Almost exactly" is going to sound wrong to the ear of many writers, and to the majority of grammarians, but it sounds right to the general public, it tells them something in a way they understand, so to my mind, it's a perfectly legitimate phrase.
But we all have to go by our own ear. My ear tells me that any word can take a qualifier if I want to give it one. OThers will have ears who say never do it.
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