The -nym means “a kind of word” acro- means “top, peak, or initial,” as in acrobat or acrophobia. “Greek?” Yes, acronym follows the model of other designations for types of words, such as synonym, antonym, and homonym. That need was met in a note in the February 1943 issue of American Notes and Queries: ‘Your correspondent who asks about words made up of the initial letters or syllables of other words may be interested in knowing that I have seen such words called by the name acronym, which is useful, and clear to anyone who knows a little Greek.’ ” – Scuba (self-contained underwater breathing apparatus)ĭo you ever wonder about the origin of a word or when it came to be a common part of the language? According to Ask.com, the word acronym originated in 1943: “As wartime production of names using initials reached an all-time high, it was high time to give a name to the growing arsenal of alphabetic abbreviations.
#What do you call abbreviations for words professional#
– SPA (Society of Professional Accountants) – OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) – AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) – NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) Some would call them acronyms, which sticklers would challenge.Īcronyms are abbreviations that are pronounced as words. Note that most people would simply call these abbreviations, which is fine. Initialisms are abbreviations that are pronounced one letter at a time. Initialisms and acronyms are two types of abbreviations that are used to shorten phrases.
So we will attempt to shed more light on the distinctions.Īccording to, an abbreviation is a shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase, used to represent the whole, as Dr. Initialismsĭictionaries don’t all agree on the definitions of these words and neither do style manuals.