Growing older presents some challenges in living in the new century. Cultural changes in technology, the workplace, music and the arts, and now, in the sudden communication explosion, tend to create a separation of understanding in everyday dialogue between those who live in "the everyday world", and seniors, who may live with less public exposure.
Add to this, the internet, 251 television channels, and a changing political, economic and social culture, as well as a shrinking world, and we have the makings of a polyglot that goes beyond languages and dialects.
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Coping with this transition is relatively easy from a language basis, since we have unconsciously all become linguists of a sort. We're accustomed to Latin "roots", much slang, and the overflow of different languages into our daily lives.
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My immediate concern has to do with Acronyms, and what is becoming a Babylon of unconnected letters that seems not to be recognized by those who most commonly initiate their use... Namely the press, and many popular information sources, like the internet.
For starters, here's the Free Dictionary list of acronyms... but before you go there, how about a guess as to the number of "accepted" acronyms.... keeping in mind that the New Oxford Dictionary listed a total of 171,000 singular words. So what do you think? How many acronyms?
6000?
60,000?
600,000?
6,000,000?
Acronyms and Abbreviations
..........
Here's where I'm running into trouble. Increasingly, information sources from almost everywhere, are presenting acronyms without specifying the antecedent term. This includes many well respected sources, including the New York Times, and Wikipedia. For those who are in a channeled interest group, as here in ER (sic) this doesn't present a problem for most, but for some of us relative newbies, seeing ACTR or SNF, or TNRT, is more than a little confusing. (I was grateful to find out that DW, didn't have to do with "divorce".) I recently read a relatively short post that contained 8 undefined, different acronyms.
As an example of the difficulty of determining the basis of an acronym, consider a most common abbreviation. "SOS" In the Acronym Free Dictionary, lists 231 different bases.
Posted here, not as a complaint or suggestion for change, or a senior "Rant" against newfangled stuff... I realize there will be no change and that this is just a personal observation.
Is it possible that we could come to a point of people talking past each other, with more misunderstanding of intent?
How much more will younger people have to learn, to cope with the future?
Bring together different languages, different dialects, different educations, throw in acronyms (including from different languages and cultures) and we'll see a mathematical construct that may even defy Google algorithms.
Stuff we write, when we get bored
Add to this, the internet, 251 television channels, and a changing political, economic and social culture, as well as a shrinking world, and we have the makings of a polyglot that goes beyond languages and dialects.
......................................................................
Coping with this transition is relatively easy from a language basis, since we have unconsciously all become linguists of a sort. We're accustomed to Latin "roots", much slang, and the overflow of different languages into our daily lives.
......................................................................
My immediate concern has to do with Acronyms, and what is becoming a Babylon of unconnected letters that seems not to be recognized by those who most commonly initiate their use... Namely the press, and many popular information sources, like the internet.
For starters, here's the Free Dictionary list of acronyms... but before you go there, how about a guess as to the number of "accepted" acronyms.... keeping in mind that the New Oxford Dictionary listed a total of 171,000 singular words. So what do you think? How many acronyms?
6000?
60,000?
600,000?
6,000,000?
Acronyms and Abbreviations
..........
Here's where I'm running into trouble. Increasingly, information sources from almost everywhere, are presenting acronyms without specifying the antecedent term. This includes many well respected sources, including the New York Times, and Wikipedia. For those who are in a channeled interest group, as here in ER (sic) this doesn't present a problem for most, but for some of us relative newbies, seeing ACTR or SNF, or TNRT, is more than a little confusing. (I was grateful to find out that DW, didn't have to do with "divorce".) I recently read a relatively short post that contained 8 undefined, different acronyms.
As an example of the difficulty of determining the basis of an acronym, consider a most common abbreviation. "SOS" In the Acronym Free Dictionary, lists 231 different bases.
Posted here, not as a complaint or suggestion for change, or a senior "Rant" against newfangled stuff... I realize there will be no change and that this is just a personal observation.
Is it possible that we could come to a point of people talking past each other, with more misunderstanding of intent?
How much more will younger people have to learn, to cope with the future?
Bring together different languages, different dialects, different educations, throw in acronyms (including from different languages and cultures) and we'll see a mathematical construct that may even defy Google algorithms.
Stuff we write, when we get bored
