Blog Archives
Abbreviation
Abbreviation is the reduction of words without impairing their understanding. It is common for these reductions to become more popular than the original, longer words.
It differs from the abbreviation because it has a broader meaning — in addition to being diachronic, that is, the formation varies and develops over time. Let's look at some examples:
[sub_table]
| Original version | Short version |
| Pneumatic | Tire |
| Car | Self |
| Microcomputer | micro |
| Photography | Photograph |
| Motorcycle | motorcycle |
| Movie theater | cinema |
| Telephone | phone |
| Kilogram | kilo |
| college | faculty |
[/su_table]
It is also common to use abbreviations in medical specialties, at
least in speech:
[su_table]
| Original version | Short version |
| Ophthalmologist | ophthalmic |
| Cardiologist | cardio |
| pulmonologist | tire |
| Physiotherapy | physio |
[/su_table]
In everyday life, we still use the abbreviation to refer to geographical terms:
[sub_table]
| Original version | Short version |
| Rio de Janeiro | River |
| Foz do Iguaçu | Mouth |
| Sao Paulo | Sampa |
[/su_table]
Acronym
Acronyms are a modern aspect of our language. According to the New Grammar of Contemporary Portuguese — by Celso Cunha and Lindley Cintra —, the acronym:
“[…] is the vocabulary creation process that consists of reducing long titles to mere acronyms, made up of the initial letters of the words that compose them.”
Also, the grammarian Celso Luft in his New Orthographic Guide defines acronym as a special case of abbreviation:
“[…] abbreviated writing of a noun phrase or compound name, by representing the initials (capital letters) of the component elements. […] It serves for abbreviated representation of titles of books, magazines, newspapers, departments, organizations, institutions, political parties, etc.”
Acronyms are also called acronyms. But, by convention, an acronym is an acronym that can be read as if it were a word. Want a well-known example among us? Petrobras — acronym for Petróleo Brasileiro SA
Check out some conventions for the use of acronyms and acronyms in a text:
- when mentioned for the first time, the acronym must be followed by its meaning, separated by a dash or placed in parentheses. Eg: UFMG (Federal University of Minas Gerais);
- if the article or work presents a previous listing of the acronyms used, it is unnecessary to write the name in full again throughout the text;
- consecrated acronyms do not need the wording of their meaning, such as Embratel, Petrobras, CNPJ, ONU;
- unlike abbreviations, abbreviations do not admit a full stop;
- acronyms of up to 3 letters are written in all capital letters. Ex: USP, ONU, PUC, MEC;
- as for their plural, it can be done by adding the lowercase “s” at the end, but without the apostrophe. Eg: NGOs (and non-NGOs).
There are, on the other hand, specific acronyms that are outside the previous rules. This is the case of CNPq, UFSCar, UnB, ProUni, MoMA, ICMBio, etc. The advice is to research how the institution adopts the spelling of its acronym, because it is possible that it is consecrated, such as those exemplified in this paragraph.
