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Pronunciation of acronyms

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Magda  #318606  Tue, 23 Jan 07 01:06 AM
Hello,
How do you pronounce the acronyms below, as one word or with each letter separately?

UCLA = the University of California, Los Angeles
MIT = the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
DBU = the Display Business Unit (of IBM)
JTB = the Japan Travel Bureau


Thank you.
  
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CalifJim  #318658  Tue, 23 Jan 07 04:43 AM
Say each letter separately for each of them.
(Don't forget that such a series has the stress on the last letter.)

CJ

  
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Clive  #318687  Tue, 23 Jan 07 06:01 AM

Hi,

Your examples are not acronyms. They are abbreviations.

An acronym is when the capital letters are pronounced as a word.

eg FBI is an abbreviation. We say each letter separately. eff  bee  eye

eg NATO is an acronym. We say naytow, not enn  eh  tee  owe

Best wishes, Clive

  
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The17pointscale  #318694  Tue, 23 Jan 07 06:32 AM
As I was looking at these abbreviations, I wondered how someone might know that UCLA isn't pronounced uck lah (I suppose that it would be an unfortunate moniker). Are there any universities that are abbreviated as acronymns? I can't think of any. Maybe the University of Pennsylvania is UPENN? I graduated from SPU and an occasional visitor mockingly referred to it as spew, but it was officially known as ess pea you.

-Andrew
  
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Grammar Geek  #318840  Tue, 23 Jan 07 02:20 PM

Penn is just called Penn.

SUNY (State Univeristy of New York) is said "Soo-nee."

I've also heard CUNY (City University of New York) is said "koo-nee" (rhymes with Rosemary or George Clooney).

In fact, SUNY Albany was SUNYA, and was sometimes called "soon-yia" (like the name "Tanya") although more often "soo-nee A."

Univerisy of Texas at El Paso is called "you-tep" (UTEP).

I'm sure there are others.

  
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Lil' Ruby Rose  #318844  Tue, 23 Jan 07 02:24 PM
In the UK, some of the newer universities have gone down the acronym route - hence UWE (University of the West of England) is You-wee, and UWIC (University of Wales in Cardiff) is You-wick.
  
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Magda  #318876  Tue, 23 Jan 07 03:27 PM
 Clive wrote:

Hi,

Your examples are not acronyms. They are abbreviations.

An acronym is when the capital letters are pronounced as a word.

eg FBI is an abbreviation. We say each letter separately. eff  bee  eye

eg NATO is an acronym. We say naytow, not enn  eh  tee  owe

Best wishes, Clive



Hi Clive,
I've been taught that there are two kinds of acronyms: pronuncable as one word, e.g. NATO, OPEC, and these ones which have each letter pronounced separetely: the EU, the UN, etc.
So, according to what I've been taught,  they are all acronyms.

Best regadrs,
Magda
  
Magda  #318885  Tue, 23 Jan 07 03:49 PM
Thank you all for your posts.

Could you give me some examples of company's acronyms like:

MIT = the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
DBU = the Display Business Unit (of IBM)
JTB = the Japan Travel Bureau

Have a good Tuesday Smile [:)]
Magda
  
Philip  #318890  Tue, 23 Jan 07 04:05 PM

 The17pointscale wrote:
As I was looking at these abbreviations, I wondered how someone might know that UCLA isn't pronounced uck lah (I suppose that it would be an unfortunate moniker). Are there any universities that are abbreviated as acronymns? I can't think of any. Maybe the University of Pennsylvania is UPENN? I graduated from SPU and an occasional visitor mockingly referred to it as spew, but it was officially known as ess pea you.

-Andrew
Living in Seattle, you most likely know that the University of Washington (UW) is known as U-Dub.

(I live just 5 minutes away from "spew".)

  
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