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The trend among dictionary editors appears to be towards including a sense defining acronym as initialism: the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary added such a sense in its 11th edition in 2003, [21] [22] and both the Oxford English Dictionary [23] [4] and The American Heritage Dictionary [24] [11] added such senses in their 2011 editions.
An initialism is another type of abbreviation similar to an acronym—but not exactly the same. Initialisms also use the first letter of each word in the phrase, but instead of combining the ...
initialism = an abbreviation pronounced wholly or partly using the names of its constituent letters, e.g., CD = compact disc, pronounced cee dee pseudo-blend = an abbreviation whose extra or omitted letters mean that it cannot stand as a true acronym, initialism, or portmanteau (a word formed by combining two or more words).
Cryptic crosswords often use abbreviations to clue individual letters or short fragments of the overall solution. These include: Any conventional abbreviations found in a standard dictionary, such as:
An abbreviation (from Latin brevis, meaning "short" [1]) is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening, contraction, initialism (which includes acronym) or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened form of a word, usually ended with a trailing period. For example: etc. is the usual abbreviation for et cetera.
An initialism is an abbreviation formed from some or all of the initial letters of words in a phrase. An acronym is sometimes considered to be an initialism that is pronounced as a word (e.g. NATO), as distinct from an initialism pronounced as a string of individual letters (e.g. "UN" for United Nations).
However, the use of full stops after letters in an initialism or acronym is declining, and many of these without punctuation have become accepted norms (e.g., "UK" and "NATO"). [b] When used in a series (typically of three, an ellipsis) the mark is also used to indicate omitted words.
A historiated initial (the letter O) from an illuminated manuscript. In a written or published work, an initial [a] is a letter at the beginning of a word, a chapter, or a paragraph that is larger than the rest of the text.