I flunked the initialism test!

Sometimes it’s the littlest things that become our epiphanies. The one I got today is—at least in part—the epiphany that not all epiphanies are grand or even all that useful. Or even necessarily something we weren’t aware of before So maybe I didn’t experience epiphany at all; maybe it was more like hearing Sinatra sing, “As the gentlemen said, ain’t that a kick in the head.”

Whatever it was, it came in the form of a little quiz in Time magazine based on the Oxford book of slang and it came because maybe—just maybe—my idea of learning computer stuff on a need-to-know basis has left me with some really huge knowledge gaps. Or maybe it was because I hate initialism (and, by extension acronyms) so bad that I have a mental block. 

Readers were supposed to “unpack these abbreviations:”

1. ICMI
2. SMH
3. WDYT
4. YOLO

In spite of the verb “unpack” which seems slightly inaccurate, I correctly realized that Time wanted me to recognize what the initials stand for. They gave no hints. Like, “Beware: If you don’t text, you may find this extra difficult.” Or “Watch it! If you hate initialism and acronyms , you’ll be annoyed by this.”  It just presented me with these four tests that looked like the old scrambled word game I knew as a child.

I didn’t know any of them. Score, a big fat zero. In case you want to see if you can best me (hint, you are certain to tie or do better!), here are the answers.

1.   ICMI: In case you missed it . . .

2.   SMH: Shaking my head . . .

3.   WDYT: What do you think . . .

4.   YOLO: You only live once . . .

The only positive thing I can say about this lowest test score of all time is that my as-needed-philosophy may need some exposure to younger folk. I mean, I was beginning to find LOL clichéd.

Happy writing, editing and promoting,

Carolyn

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 Carolyn Howard-Johnson edits, consults. and speaks on issues of publishing. Find her The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success (How To Do It Frugally series of book for writers). Learn more about her other authors' aids at www.howtodoitfrugally.com/writers_books.htm , where writers will find lists and other helps including Great Little Last-Minute Editing Tips on the Resources for Writers page. She blogs on all things publishing (not just editing!) at her Sharing with Writers blog. She tweets writers' resources at www.twitter.com/frugalbookpromo . Please tweet this post to your followers. We all need a little help with editing. (-:

Editing Tip: My daughter the PHD candidate sent this tip: “Chicago recommends omitting periods in abbreviations of academic degrees (BA, DDS, etc.) unless they are required for reasons of tradition or consistency with, for example, a journal’s established style.—CMOS 16, 10.20"

So my question for her. (Yeah, I'm letting her do the research. I'm in the middle of editing hell! (-: ) What about PHD and other initials that are usually seen with both caps and lower case? Do we make it upper and lower case? PhD?  Or PHD? 

Or, if any of you love Chicago like she and I do, look it up and let me know.  I'll soon have graduation invitations to send out and will need to know. (-:








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Carolyn Howard-Johnson edits, consults. and speaks on issues of publishing. Find her The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0978515870. Learn more about her other authors' aids at www.howtodoitfrugally.com, where writers will find lists and other helps on the Resources for Writers page. She blogs on all things publishing (not just editing!) at her Sharing with Writers blog. She tweets writers' resources at www.twitter.com/frugalbookpromo. Please tweet this post to your followers. We all need a little help with editing. (-:

About Acronyms, Initialism and Cadillacs

I had to laugh.

It seems the auto companies have gotten themselves into hot water over initials. It used to be they gave cars names that meant something—exotic car names like El Dorado. Or words that connoted speed like Mustang. Or mischievous ones like Gremlin (a word I use in The Frugal Editor, by the way, to establish an image of the stuff that happens to upset our best editing intentions.)

Ken Bensinger, an LA Times staff writer*, points out that Ford's Mark Fields made a mistake when he was speaking at the LA Auto Show. He apparently couldn't keep all his MKXs and MKZs and MKTs straight. Bensinger asked that if he can't, how is the car-buying public going to do any better?

Which brings us to those acronyms. The word acronym applies to those initials that spell out another word that is often related to the meaning of what they stand for in some way. SPAN (Small Publishers of North America) is one of those. Ford's MKX is not one of those because the letters don't spell a name. Some are calling this a initialism. And we're seeing more of it all the time.

The letters MKX might initially give a car-buyer a certain feeling of power, but that intent is getting lost among all of Ford's other MKs. And Lexus's LSs, GSs, ESs, ISs, etc. Volvo uses S with lots of numbers. S40, S60, S80. Vs, too. My point is they soon become meaningless until even the executive vice president of Ford Motor Company can't keep his letters straight—or meaningful.

The same is true of our writing. Theoretically we write for clarity. Many suggest writers use the full name of an entity and then resort to initials or acronyms thereafter. That makes sense. But have you ever run into those letters later in an article and had to go back to search for what they meant? That is not clarity. That's a damned puzzle.

Some might counter that we use initials and acronyms in the interest of brevity. Sometimes we are limited to word count, though that's rarely the case online. Web pages can go on forever.

Some say brevity is next to Godliness. I say, no! With a resounding but seldom used exclamation point! Not when it comes to acronyms and strings of initials. No, sir. I'll take a few extra words any time.

So, here's a good rule of thumb. The first time you use a title, use the letters you intend to use later as an indication right after it. Put them in parentheses. But wait! Even that won't leave you home free. When you're tempted to use initials again, assess how long it has been since you used the whole name. A sentence. A couple paragraphs. A page or two? Factor in that people are busy today. They read quickly. Work out your own guidelines for this, depending on your writer's sixth sense and the familiarity of your audience with whatever it is you're initializing. It's a style choice, but I say error on the side of overkill (and clarity) rather than brevity every single time you're in doubt.

This is an issue that goes beyond style. Teresa Pavia, professor of marketing at the University of Utah says "The poor consumers can't keep anything straight any more." And I say, ditto for readers in general.
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*If anyone wants to research the whole article find it on Pages C1 and C6, LA Times, Saturday, January 05, 2008

Acronym, Initials, Initialism or Just Plain Bad Writing

Below you will find an entry from a booklet I am writing to help promote The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward To Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success. Its working title is Zero-Tolerance Editors' Aids: How To Get Your Manuscript Past the Gatekeepers. It will be available early in 2008.

acronym/initialism: Webster says an acronym is a word formed from the initial (or first few) letters of a series of words. NOW for National Organization of Women, as an example. Or radar, which was originally from radio detecting and ranging. But if a pronounceable word isn't formed so that you still have to say all the letters (say something like ABWA for American Business Women's Association, that's not an acronym. Some are calling it initialism or--I believe more accurately--just plain initials. The point is, you're writing for clarity; tell your reader what those letters stand for whether they form an acronym or not.

So, regardless of what you call that jumble of letters or what label Webster puts on it, letters strung together as initials should be used cautiously. Always write out what they mean when they first appear, and avoid them whenever possible forever after that. To do otherwise is just plain bad writing.
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Watch for Zero-Tolerance Editors' Aids: How To Get Your Manuscript Past the Gatekeepers on my website (http://www.howtodoitfrugally.com) or in my newsletter, Sharing with Writers. To subscribe to Sharing with Writers, send an e-mail with "SUBSCRIBE" in the subject line to HoJoNews@aol.com. Learn more about publishing tips booklets by scrolling to the bottom segment on this blog page to see what Tips Booklet Guru Paulette Ensign has to say.