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Abbreviations are shortened forms of words or lengthy phrases. You'll nd them in almost every
discipline and area of life, from commonly used abbreviations in names or titles, such as Mr. for Mister
or Pres. for President, to less commonly used abbreviations, such as the short version of the word
abbreviation itself, which is abbr.

There is more than one type of abbreviation. An acronym is a new word created from the initial letters of
a long name or phrase, for example, NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization). An initialism is where a
long phrase is abbreviated to its initial letters but the letters are pronounced individually, not spoken as
a word - for example, FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation). An initialism can be considered a type of
acronym.

The U.S. is itself a well-established abbreviation, as are the shortened forms of the 50 states, like NY for
New York. As you will see in the following list of commonly used abbreviations they exist in all areas of life
from medicine to military and geography to baking.

Written and verbal communication often includes these abbreviations:

approx. - approximately
appt. - appointment
apt. - apartment
A.S.A.P. - as soon as possible
B.Y.O.B. - bring your own bottle, used for parties where guests are expected to bring their own drinks
or restaurants that don't sell alcohol.
c/o - care of, used when sending mail to someone who's not at their usual address
dept. - department
D.I.Y. - Do it yourself
est. - established
E.T.A. - estimated time of arrival
min. - minute or minimum
misc. - miscellaneous
Mr. - Mister
Mrs. - Mistress (pronounced Missus)
 no. - number
R.S.V.P. - Répondez, s'il vous plait, this initialism comes from the French for "please reply." It's used on
invitations to parties and events and is intended (as it says) to be responded to with a "yes, we will
attend," or "no, we will not."
tel. - telephone
temp. - temperature or temporary
vet. - veteran or veterinarian
vs. - versus

Abbreviations are also necessary for measurements for cooking and baking - after all, your cake won't
come out very well if you don't know the di erence between:

tsp or t - teaspoon/teaspoons
tbs, tbsp or T - tablespoon/tablespoons
c - cup/cups
gal - gallon
lb - pound/pounds
pt - pint
qt - quart

If you want to nd your way around, you better know location abbreviations such as:

Ave. - Avenue
Blvd. - Boulevard
Cyn. - Canyon
Dr. - Drive
Ln. - Lane
Rd. - Road
St. - Street

E - east
N - north
NE - northeast
NW - northwest
S - south
SE - southeast
SW - southwest
W - west

Abbreviations often show up in describing academic and job titles. For example:
 BA - Bachelor of Arts
BS - Bachelor of Science
MA - Master of Arts
M.PHIL or MPHIL - Master of Philosophy
JD - Juris Doctor
DC - Doctor of Chiropractic
PA - Personal Assistant
MD - Managing Director
VP - Vice President
SVP - Senior Vice President
EVP - Executive Vice President
CMO - Chief Marketing O cer
CFO - Chief Financial O cer
CEO - Chief Executive O cer

The advent of the internet brought about a whole new range of abbreviations into our daily lives. For the
sake of brevity, our texts, tweets, and chats are now made up many abbreviations. For example:

ACE - a cool experience

AD - awesome dude
AFAIK - as far as I know
AFK - away from keyboard
ANI - age not important
BRB - be right back
CUL - see you later
CWYL - chat with you later
IIRC - if I recall/remember correctly
IQ - ignorance quotient
LOL - laugh out loud
NP - no problem
ROFL - rolling on the oor laughing
TY - thank you
WC - wrong conversation

These are just a handful of innumerable abbreviations that are used online and on our phones.

During the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt created a number of agencies to
stimulate job growth in the United States. Known as "alphabet agencies," these are some of the most
famous abbreviations today.
 AAA - The Agricultural Adjustment Act. This act was created in 1933 to compensate farmers for not
planting crops as a way to increase the demand for certain agricultural products and raise prices. By
1936, the Supreme Court ruled that the act was to be voided.

CCC - The Civilian Conservation Corps. Single men between 18-25 were selected to form this corps,
which would work on conserving wildlife and national preservation areas, in addition to planting
trees and ghting erosion.
CWA - The Civil Works Administration. Four million people were employed by the CWA to work in
renovation and construction jobs such as building repair, road building, and other infrastructural
work.
FDIC - The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Since banks were widely distrusted after the many bank
failures during the depression, this alphabet agency was created to encourage public con dence in
banks again by insuring customers against losses of up to $5,000 if the bank happened to fail.
FHA - The Federal Housing Administration. This organization was created to help people secure loans
to buy houses.
NRA - The National Recovery Administration. In 1933, the NRA was created to attempt to aid de ation
and encourage market competition, in order to restore the economy. Unfortunately, the
administration did not stimulate industrial production, although investor and consumer con dence
were restored.
SSA - The Social Security Administration. The Social Security Act, administered by the Social Security
Administration, created a national pension for retired people as well as unemployment insurance
and government aid for single mothers, children, and handicapped persons.

Looking at Latin, the root of much of the English language is a good way to decipher abbreviations. The
most common abbreviations that we use in day-to-day life are derived from this ancient language. For
example:

AM/PM - AM, which we use to denote morning, is an abbreviation for ante meridiem (before noon), and
PM stands for post meridiem (after noon).
AD - The era in which we live, AD, is actually an abbreviation for Anno Domini, or "The Year of Our
Lord."

Latin has also gifted us with other abbreviations we use so frequently that, at times, we forget what they
stand for. For instance:

e.g. - You will often see the abbreviation e.g. before someone gives an example. It stands for exampli
gratia, which means, "example given."
etc - "Etc", often seen at the end of long lists, is short for etcetera, which means "and other things."
i.e. - Another popular abbreviation we use in daily life, i.e. stands for id est, meaning, "that is."
n.b. - This is sometimes written at the end of a communication that needs special attention. It stands
for nota bene, which means "take notice," or "note well."
P.S. - At the end of a letter or email, people will often add a P.S. to include an additional comment or
thought. It is short for post script, which means "written after."
 viz - Another Latin abbreviation you may see is "viz", which is short for videlicet, meaning "namely."

Abbreviations are a common part of our lives, they save us time and space in our written
communication. In other words, almost anything you want to do, from o cial documents to text
messages, will require you to know an abbreviation or two. Remember that although an abbreviation
usually consists of a letter or group of letters taken from a word or phrase, that's not always the case,
especially in the case of measurements.

The United States is commonly abbreviated to U.S.

YourDictionary de nition and usage example. Copyright © 2018 by LoveToKnow Corp

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Zoni Doll • 4 years ago

what is stand by m.phil??
106 △ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

shonangreg > Zoni Doll • 4 years ago

Master of Philosophy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
2△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Shafqat Ali > Zoni Doll • 4 years ago

master of philosephy
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

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Guest • 5 years ago

Below are the two very commonly used Acronyms

SD Card-Secure Digital

DSLR-Digital Single Lens Reflex

6△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

deepu naidu > Guest • 2 years ago

usb-universal serial bus
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Erin Durham-Hale • 5 months ago

You have CIA wrong. It should be Cannabis Inspection Agent.
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Allan Richardson > Erin Durham-Hale • 10 days ago

I've seen T-shirts for men that read "FBI" in large font, all capitals, with the phrase "Female Body
Inspector" in smaller font underneath (or on the back). Come to think of it, lesbians might want to wear
such a shirt also.
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Cloud Of ̷ Atasuk • 6 months ago

what does iwtddd stand for?
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
Abhishek Rana • 4 years ago
HEOTEL
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Guest • 5 years ago

IPS Diaplay(Used in mobiles)-In-Plane Switching
OTG(Used to connect devices to smart phone)-On The Go

Rx-Medication
Dx-Prescription
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

arif khan > Guest • 4 years ago

Rx is basically sign used in old Greeks books for planet Jupiter and this was planet responsible for
health,
Ref. Science facts written by Uday lal
59 △ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Allan Richardson > arif khan • 10 days ago

I didn't know that! Coincidentally, it could also be based on the Latin word "recipe" meaning
"take." Or maybe both.
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Yen • 4 years ago

What is 1-1,1 letters for the word Great!
1△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

eric pethers • 4 months ago

you say "An initialism can be considered a type of acronym" but only abbreviations that make new words are
considered to be an acronym so how does that work?
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

Editor Mod > eric pethers • 4 months ago

If you view our initialism definition page you'll see it's defined as "an acronym or abbreviation formed
from initial letters"
https://www.yourdictionary....
While there's a difference in how the new abbreviation is pronounced in acronyms and initialisms,
making you think there should be a clear distinction between them, they are usually grouped together
as types of abbreviations.
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›

eric pethers > Editor • 4 months ago

if it doesn't make a word it is NOT an acronym. So while all acronyms are abbreviations not all
abbreviations are acronyms...
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Aaditya • 4 months ago
What is the abbreviation for " of the " ???
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Night Shadow • 7 months ago

What is the abbreviation for 'official'? (I'm Italian)
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Michael @ YD Mod > Night Shadow • 7 months ago

"Official" is a word that isn't abbreviated all that often, but I've most commonly seen it as OFL or OFF.
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Araceli Orozco • 10 months ago

I wish there was LOL
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Zoef De Haas • a year ago

You write: 'AM, which we use to denote morning, is an abbreviation for ante meridian, and PM stands for post
meridian.'
As prepositions 'post' and 'ante' are followed by the accusative, AM and PM are abbreviations of ante
meridiEM and post meridiEM.
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Editor Mod > Zoef De Haas • 10 months ago

Thanks for bringing that to our attention. It will be corrected.
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Dave Beckham • a year ago

FBI federal boureal information
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Lingua Lab Amsterdam • a year ago

well done!
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Madahaone Malale • 3 years ago

Some one give me the standard sbbreviation for "Pay special attention"
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Kawaii Tunicorn • 3 years ago

What is the abbreviation for the?
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_xwesumeness__1_ > Kawaii Tunicorn • 2 years ago

de or d
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Omid Eftekhari • 3 years ago

 Omid Eftekhari • 3 years ago
Thx also means thankyou
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Japheth • 4 years ago

what is the meaning of uppercase and lowercase abbreviations
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Avatar This comment was deleted.

Lynn St John > Guest • 4 years ago

In search of
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Sumlang Mung > Guest • 4 years ago

International Standard Organization
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Avatar This comment was deleted.

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mike biceb • 2 years ago

what its mean (CNIC NO.)
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VASUNDHARA CHANDEL • 2 years ago

How to write which and with in short
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Jane > VASUNDHARA CHANDEL • a year ago

with is "w"
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Preston Cottrell > Jane • 10 months ago

i use w/
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Nepal Neyaj > VASUNDHARA CHANDEL • 2 years ago

Whch wth
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