Talk:List of initialisms

Is there a difference between initialisms and abbreviations, if so what is it? Dieter Simon 21:28 30 May 2003 (UTC)

An abbreviation is any shortening of a word or phrase, e.g.

Mister -> Mr.

Johannesburg -> Jo'burg

North Atlantic Treaty Organization -> NATO

Light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation -> laser

Weapons of Mass Destruction -> WMD

Only the last example (WMD) is an initialism, which is an abbreviation composed of the initial parts of words, all the parts being pronounced individually. NATO is not an initialism because it is pronounced as a single word, not as four individual letters. One or two of the above examples, depending on your definition, are also acronyms. My source for this explanation is the OED. -- Heron

I didn't realize that, many thanks, Heron, that's cleared that up --Dieter Simon

It's not quite cleared up. In The Canadian Style (Dep't of Sec'y of State) 1985 p31: "An acronym is a pronounceable word formed from the first letter or letters of a series of other words...An initialism is formed from the initial letters only of a series of words and may not be pronounceable." Which I read as may or may not, esp since not everyone agrees on what is and isn't pronounceable. So NATO and AIDS are both initialisms (no more than the first letter of the words) and acronyms (pronounceable initialisms). Wish I had an OED to see exactly what it says...

Furthermore, I see ASAP in acronyms...and I've very seldom heard it pronounced other than "eh es eh pea". (And is its other pronounciation "eh sap" or "ahsap"? If the former, which sounds most natural to me, then RBOC could not be logically excluded as "are bock".) shrug

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Why the heck the page is protected? -- Taku 16:42 31 May 2003 (UTC)

Probably an accident - it's quite easy to protect a page by mistake, because the link to do so is right next door to other useful links. I've unprotected it now. --Camembert

Thanks. -- Taku