Is our language growing or shrinking? On one hand, new words and terminology are developed almost daily, especially in the worlds of technology, medicine, government, military and pop culture. So new words are expanding our language.

  On the other hand, there is evidence that it is shrinking. We don’t teach cursive writing, also known as longhand, in schools anymore. Years ago in secretarial schools, shorthand was taught, which was a series of squiggle-like marks than enabled a secretary to take dictation quickly from a boss. Some reporters used the same techniques when jotting down the facts of a story or at a press conference. (Digital recorders replaced that practice.)

  But what really has shortened our language was the development and use of acronyms, the alphabet soup of every speech. It became a necessity in our increasingly face-paced and space cramped lives. And we readily accept them because isn’t it much easier to say JFK than John Fitzgerald Kennedy?

   We even use many acronyms and don’t even know their origins, like OK and IKEA. IKEA is

named for the company’s owner Ingvar Kamprad  Elmtaryd Agunnaryd. Wow, thats a mouthful. 

   There are literally thousands of industry-specific acronyms used in the world. The USG (United States Government) has acronyms for all their departments and each department has its own list. For instance, the CDC is listed under the HHS. Google it. I’m not going to type these out. 

   Here is a list of common acronyms we use:

  24/7, AA, AC, AKA, ASAP, ATM, B&B, BC, BLT, BYOB, CC, COP, EOD, ET, FDR, FYI,

GC, GM, GMO, HAZ-MAT, ID, IQ, ISBN, JFK, MC, MLK, MO, MTD, NIB, NIMBY, OJ, PBJ, PC, PDA, PI, PIN, PM, POA, POTUS, PS, PSI, PTO, Q&A, R&R, RIP, RSVP, SCUBA, SOP,

SOS, SPF, TBA, TBD, TGIF, TIA, TLC, TTYL, UFO, UPC, VIP, WOM, WTB and YTD.

   I could not include their meanings because I ran out of space.