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Of the two words, acronym is the much more frequently used and known, and many speakers and writers refer to all abbreviations formed from initial letters as acronyms. However, many others differentiate between acronyms and initialisms. An acronym is a pronounceable word formed from the initial letter or letters of the constituent words, such as NATO. An initialism is an abbreviation pronounced as the names of the individual letters, and is formed only from the initial letter of constituent words, such as HTML. This distinction is supported by many dictionary definitions, but not by all.
Acronyms and initialisms are a relatively new linguistic phenomenon, having only become popular during the 20th century. As literacy rates rose, the practice of referring to words by their first letters became increasingly convenient. The first recorded use of the word initialism in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is in 1899, and the first for acronym is in 1943. The word acronym comes from Greek: ακρον, akron, "limb" + ονομα, onoma, "name").
Nonetheless, earlier examples of acronyms exist. The early Christians in Rome used a fish as a symbol for Jesus in part because of an acronym — fish in Greek is ΙΧΘΥΣ ( ichthus), which was said to stand for Ιησους Χριστος Θεου Υιος Σωτηρ (Iesous CHristos THeou Uios Soter: Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior). Evidence of this interpretation dates from the second and third centuries and is preserved in the catacombs of Rome.
Acronyms and initialisms often occur in jargonJargon as distinct from slang, is specialist technical terminology used by those who work in a particular profession. Calling something jargon may have mild pejorative connotations. A more neutral phrase is term of art especially in legal language, the im or as names of organizations because they often serve as abbreviations of long terms that are frequently referenced, so a shortened form is desirable. Militaries and government agencies frequently employ acronyms and initialisms, perhaps most famously the US Government and the so-called alphabet agencies of Roosevelt's New DealAlternate meaning: New Deal (UK The New Deal was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's legislative agenda for rescuing the United States from the Great Depression. It was widely believed that the depression was caused by the inherent instability of the market. Cynics have quipped that acronyms are used to obfuscate.
Abbreviations have been traditionally written using a full stop/periodA full stop or period also called a full point is the punctuation mark commonly placed at the end of several different types of sentences in English and several other languages. A period consists of a small dot placed at the end of a line of text, thus: " to mark the part that was deleted. In the case of most acronyms and initialisms, each letter is its own abbreviation, and in theory should get its own period. This usage is becoming less common as the presence of all capital letters is sufficient to indicate the word is an abbreviation; nevertheless some influential style guideStyle guides generally give guidance on language use. Some style guides consider or focus on elements of graphic design, such as typography and white space. Web site style guides often focus on visual or technical aspects. Overview Traditionally, a styles still insist on the many-periods treatment, such as the one used by the New York Times (which recommends periods after unpronouncible acronyms such as "K.G.B." but not pronouncible ones, such as "NATO" [1]), but others, such as at the BBC, no longer require this.
Some acronyms undergo assimilation into ordinary words: often they are then written in lower case, and eventually it is widely forgotten that the word was derived from the initials of others: scuba and laser, for instance. The term anacronym has been coined as a portmanteau of the words anachronism and acronym to describe acronyms whose original meaning is not known to most speakers.
While typically abbreviations exclude the initials of short function words (such as "and," "or," "of," or "to"), they are sometimes included in acronyms to make them pronounceable.
The traditional style of pluralizing single letters with "'s" ("there are two Q's in that word") was naturally extended to acronyms when they were commonly written with periods, and is still preferred by some people, especially when the acronym is pronounced as separate letters. However, today it is more usual to inflect them like ordinary words; thus the usual plural of "CD" is "CDs," with "CD's" being reserved for the possessive.
In some cases, an acronym or initialism has been turned into a name. The letters making up the name of the SAT college entrance test, for example, no longer officially stand for anything. This trend has been common with many companies hoping to retain their brand recognition while simultaneously moving away from what they saw as an outdated image: American Telephone and Telegraph is now simply AT&T, the company formerly named Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name to " KFC" (though whether to avoid negative connotations of the word "fried," or regional associations with Kentucky, or to allow products other than chicken remains a subject of speculation); British Petroleum changed its name to " BP" to emphasize that it was no longer only an oil company (captured by the motto "beyond petroleum"); and Silicon Graphics, Incorporated changed its name to "SGI" to emphasize that it was no longer only a computer graphics company. Initialisms may have advantages in international markets; for example, some national affiliates of International Business Machines are legally incorporated as "IBM" (or, for example, "IBM Canada") to avoid translating the full name into local languages.
Sometimes, the initials are kept but the meaning is changed. SADD, for instance, originally Students Against Drunk Driving, changed the full form of its name to Students Against Destructive Decisions. YM originally stood for Young Miss, and later Young & Modern, but now stands for simply Your Magazine.
When initialisms are defined in print, especially in the case of industry-specific jargon, the words forming the abbreviation are often capitalized for clarity. While this would be perfectly acceptable for proper nouns like Kentucky Fried Chicken, some usage writers have argued that it is technically incorrect for other terms like storage area network. Correct or not, such usage is widespread in English publications.