|
A special type of macronym, the recursive acronym, has letters whose expansion refers back to the macronym itself. One of the earliest examples appears in The Hacker's Dictionary as MUNG, which stands for "MUNG Until No Good". Some examples of recursive acronyms are: GNU stands for "GNU's Not Unix" LAME stands for "LAME Ain't an MP3 Encoder" PHP stands for "PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor" WINE stands for "WINE Is Not an Emulator" HURD stands for "HIRD of Unix-replacing daemons", where HIRD itself stands for "HURD of interfaces representing depth" (a "mutually recursive" acronym) Non-English languages Specific languages Chinese In English language discussions of languages with syllabic or logographic writing systems (such as Chinese, Japanese, and Korean), acronym describes short forms that take selected characters from a multi-character word. For example, in Chinese, the word "大學"/"大学" ("university" in traditional/simplified Chinese, literally "big school"), when used with the name of the university, is usually abbreviated simply as "大" *"big"). So "北京大学" (Beijing University ("北京" = "Beijing", literally "north capital")) is commonly abbreviated to "北大" (literally "north big"). In this case, the first characters "北" and "大" from "北京" and "大学" are taken to compose the short form. In some cases, however, other characters than the first can be selected. For example, the local short form of "香港大學" (Hong Kong University, "香港" = "Hong Kong") is "港大" rather than "香大". There are also cases where some longer phrases are abbreviated drastically, especially in Chinese politics, where proper nouns were initially translated from Soviet Leninist terms. For instance, the full name of China's highest ruling council, the Politburo Standing Committee (PSC), is "Standing Committee of the Central Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China" (中国共产党中央政治局常务委员会). The term then reduced the "Communist Party of China" part of its name through acronyms, then the "Standing Committee" part, again through acronyms, to create "中共中央政治局常委". Alternatively, it omitted the "Communist Party" part altogether, creating "Politburo Standing Committee" (政治局常委会), and eventually just "Standing Committee" (常委会). The PSC's members full designations are "Member of the Standing Committee of the Central Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China" (中国共产党中央政治局常务委员会委员); this was eventually drastically reduced to simply Changwei (常委), with the term Ruchang (入常) used increasingly for officials destined for a future seat on the PSC. In another example, the word "全国人民代表大会" (National People's Congress) can be broken into four parts: "全国" = "the whole nation", "人民" = "people", "代表" = "representatives", "大会" = "conference". Yet, in its short form "人大" (literally "man/people big"), only the first characters from the second and the fourth parts are selected; the first part ("全国") and the third part ("代表") are simply ignored. In describing such abbreviations, the term initialism is inapplicable.[original research?] Many proper nouns become shorter and shorter over time. For example, the CCTV New Year's Gala, whose full name is literally read as "China Central Television Spring Festival Joint Celebration Evening Gala" (中国中央电视台春节联欢晚会) was first shortened to "Spring Festival Joint Celebration Evening Gala" (春节联欢晚会), but eventually referred to as simply Chunwan (春晚). Along the same vein, Zhongguo Zhongyang Dianshi Tai (中国中央电视台) was reduced to Yangshi (央视) in the mid-2000s. Korean Many aspects of academics in Korea follow similar acronym patterns as Chinese, owing to the languages' commonalities, like using the word for "big," dae (대) to refer to universities (대학, daehak, "big school"). They can be interpreted similar to American university appellations, such as "UPenn" or "Texas Tech." Some acronyms are shortened forms of the school's name, like how Hongik University (홍익대학교, Hongik Daehakgyo) is shortened to Hongdae (홍대, "Big Hong" or "Hong U.") Other acronyms can refer to the university's main subject, e.g. Korea National University of Education (한국교원대학교, Hanguk Gyowon Daehakgyo) is shortened to Gyodae (교대, "Big Ed." or "Ed. U."). Other schools use a Koreanized version of their English acronym. The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (한국과학기술원, Hanguk Gwahak Gisulwon) is referred to as KAIST (카이스트, Kaiseuteu) in both English and Korean. The 3 most prestigious schools in Korea are known as SKY (스카이, seukai), combining the first letter of their English names (Seoul National, Korea, and Yonsei Universities). In addition, the College Scholastic Ability Test (대학수학능력시험, Daehak Suhak Neungryeok Siheom) is shortened to Suneung (수능, "S.A."). German To a greater degree than English does, German tends toward acronyms that use initial syllables rather than initial single letters, although it uses many of the latter type as well. Some examples of the syllabic type are Gestapo rather than GSP (for Geheime Staatspolizei, secret state police); Flak rather than FAK (for Fliegerabwehrkanone, anti-aircraft gun); Kripo rather than KP (for Kriminalpolizei, detective division police). The extension of such contraction to a pervasive or whimsical degree has been mockingly labeled Aküfi (for Abkürzungsfimmel, strange habit of abbreviating). Examples of Aküfi include Vokuhila (for vorne kurz, hinten lang, short in the front, long in the back, i.e., a mullet) and the mocking of Adolf Hitler's title as Gröfaz (Größter Feldherr aller Zeiten, Greatest General of all Times). Hebrew Main article: Hebrew acronyms It is common to take more than just one initial letter from each of the words composing the acronym; regardless of this, the abbreviation sign gershayim is always written between the second-last and last letters of the non-inflected form of the acronym, even if by this it separates letters of the same original word. Examples: ארה״ב (for ארצות הברית, the United States); ברה״מ (for ברית המועצות, the Soviet Union); ראשל״צ (for ראשון לציון, Rishon LeZion); ביה״ס (for בית הספר, the school). An example that takes only the initial letters from its component words is צה״ל ("Tzahal", for צבא הגנה לישראל, Israel Defense Forces). In inflected forms the abbreviation sign gershayim remains between the second-last and last letters of the non-inflected form of the acronym (e.g. "report", singular: "דו״ח", plural: "דו״חות"; "squad commander", masculine: "מ״כ", feminine: "מ״כית"). Indonesian See also: List of Indonesian acronyms and abbreviations There is also a widespread use of acronyms in Indonesia in every aspect of social life. For example, the Golkar political party stands for Partai Golongan Karya, Monas stands for "Monumen Nasional" (National Monument), the Angkot public transport stands for "Angkutan Kota" (city public transportation), warnet stands for "warung internet" (internet cafe), and many others. Some acronyms are considered formal (or officially adopted), while many more are considered informal, slang or colloquial. The capital's metropolitan area (Jakarta and its surrounding satellite regions), Jabodetabek, is another infamous acronym. This stands for Jakarta-Bogor-Depok-Tangerang-Bekasi. Many highways are also named by the acronym method; e.g. Jalan Tol (Toll Road) Jagorawi (Jakarta-Bogor-Ciawi) and Purbaleunyi (Purwakarta-Bandung-Cileunyi), Joglo Semar (Jogja-solo-semarang). In some languages, especially those that use certain alphabets, many acronyms come from the military. The Indonesian military (TNI—Tentara Nasional Indonesia) and Indonesian police (POLRI—Kepolisian Republik Indonesia) are infamous for heavy acronyms use. Examples include the Kopassus (Komando Pasukan Khusus; Special Forces Command), Kopaska (Komando Pasukan Katak; Frogmen Command), Kodim (Komando Distrik Militer; Military District Command—one of the Indonesian army's administrative divisions), Serka (Sersan Kepala; Head Sergeant), Akmil (Akademi Militer; Military Academy—in Magelang) and many other terms regarding ranks, units, divisions, procedures, etc. Heavy acronym use by Indonesians, makes it difficult for foreigners and learners of Bahasa Indonesia to seek information and news in Indonesian media.[citation needed] Japanese Main article: Japanese abbreviated and contracted words The Japanese language makes extensive use of acronyms. This is most prevalent in katakana transcriptions of foreign words; for example, the Pokémon media franchise's name originally stood for "pocket monsters" (ポケット·モンスター→ポケモン), which is still the long-form of the name in Japanese, and "wāpuro" stands for "word processor" (ワード·プロセッサー→ワープロ). However, the practice is also common with native kanji and hiragana words. Russian Acronyms that use parts of words (not necessarily syllables) are commonplace in Russian as well, e.g. Газпром (Gazprom, for Газовая промышленность/Gazovaya promyshlennost, gas industry). There are also initialisms, such as СМИ (SMI, for средства массовой информации/sredstva massovoy informatsii, means of mass informing, i.e. mass media). Another Russian acronym, ГУЛаг (GULag) combines two initials and three letters of the final word: it stands for Главное управление лагерей (Glavnoe upravlenie lagerey, Chief Administration of Camps). Swahili In Swahili, acronyms are common for naming organizations such as TUKI, which stands for "Taasisi ya Uchunguzi wa Kiswahili" (the institute for Swahili research). Multiple initial letters (often the initial syllable of words) are often drawn together, as seen more in some languages than others. General grammatical considerations Declension In languages where nouns are declined, various methods are used. An example is Finnish, where a colon is used to separate inflection from the letters: An acronym is pronounced as a word: Nato [nato]—Natoon [natoːn] "into Nato" An acronym is pronounced as letters: EU [eː uː]—EU:hun [eː uːhun] "into EU" An acronym is interpreted as words: EU [euroːpan unioni]—EU:iin [euroːpan unioniːn] "into EU" The process above is similar to how, in English, hyphens are used for clarity when prefixes are added to acronyms, thus pre-NATO policy (rather than preNATO). Lenition In languages such as Scottish Gaelic and Irish, where lenition (initial consonant mutation) is commonplace, acronyms must also be modified in situations where case and context dictate it. In the case of Scottish Gaelic, a lower case "h" is added after the initial consonant; for example, BBC Scotland in the genitive case would be written as BhBC Alba, with the acronym pronounced "VBC". Likewise, the Gaelic acronym for "television" (gd: telebhisean) is TBh, pronounced "TV", as in English. Extremes The longest acronym, according to the 1965 edition of Acronyms, Initialisms and Abbreviations Dictionary, is ADCOMSUBORDCOMPHIBSPAC, a United States Navy term that stands for "Administrative Command, Amphibious Forces, Pacific Fleet Subordinate Command." Another term COMNAVSEACOMBATSYSENGSTA, which stands for "Commander, Naval Sea Systems Combat Engineering Station" is longer but the word "Combat" is not shortened. The world's longest acronym, according to the Guinness Book of World Records is NIIOMTPLABOPARMBETZHELBETRABSBOMONIMONKONOTDTEKHSTROMONT (Нииомтплабопармбетжелбетрабсбомонимонконотдтехстромонт). The 56-letter acronym (54 in Cyrillic) is from the Concise Dictionary of Soviet Terminology and means "The laboratory for shuttering, reinforcement, concrete and ferroconcrete operations for composite-monolithic and monolithic constructions of the Department of the Technology of Building-assembly operations of the Scientific Research Institute of the Organization for building mechanization and technical aid of the Academy of Building and Architecture of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics." (научно-исследовательская [...] лаборатория операций по армированию бетона и железобетонных работ по сооружению сборно-монолитных и монолитных конструкций отдела технологии строительно-монтажного управления) The card-game Magic: The Gathering has a playing card called "Our Market Research Shows That Players Like Really Long Card Names So We Made this Card to Have the Absolute Longest Card Name Ever Elemental", with text on it saying: "Just call it OMRSTPLRLCNSWMTCTHTALCNEE for short."[66] |
About us|Jobs|Help|Disclaimer|Advertising services|Contact us|Sign in|Website map|Search|
GMT+8, 2015-9-11 20:55 , Processed in 0.186864 second(s), 16 queries .
