Sensesliterally

Sensesliterally is a term used in linguistic and literary discussions to describe a stance or method that foregrounds literal sensory interpretation of statements or texts. Proponents emphasize actual sensory experience—sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell—over figurative or metaphorical readings, and treat descriptions as if they correspond to verifiable sensory data.

The coinage blends senses and literally and appears in online discourse from the early 2010s onward, gaining traction in blogs, forums, and discussions about language, perception, and art. It is sometimes used humorously or critically to critique excessive literalism.

In literary criticism, sensesliterally is invoked to examine how imagery encodes sensory details and how readers respond to purportedly literal versus figurative signals. It can function as a methodological stance in debates about figurative language, or as a rhetorical device in arguing for precision in description.

Scholars note that the term often signals a tension between luminal sensory data and abstraction, and that it risks oversimplifying how readers encode metaphor, metonymy, and emotion. Some writers use it to highlight the difference between spoken language and perceived experience.

See also literalism; sensory perception; figurative language; linguistics; cognitive science.