Acronyms are those initial letters of a word that are widely used as an abbreviation to designate a position, title, an entity, body, companies, among others. For example OBE is the acronym that is used as an abbreviation for the British Chivalric Order, which is an honor with which the English monarchs distinguish people who have made a contribution to their homeland.
It is made up of the most important words and not the secondary terms
They are generally formed from the most prominent words, that is, secondary terms such as prepositions will be left aside and will not enter the formation of the acronym. In the example that we provide lines above we see this clearly, since the word is not part of the acronym. In any case, this does not imply that there are acronyms that do contain all the terms that make up the name of an organization, even though they are prepositions and conjunctions.
It is also called acronyms to that word or title that is made up of the initials of the words that name an organization, company, among others, for example, WHO (World Health Organization), CABJ (Boca Juniors Athletic Club).
Many acronyms become formal terms thanks to their widespread use
There are acronyms that due to their widespread use become words, terms per se, which are even accepted by the corresponding language academies.
In this way, the acronym that becomes a formal word becomes an acronym, as those words that are made up of the initials of words are called. Many times it also happens that consciousness about the origin of the acronym, that is, of the words that compose it, is lost, and as we have just pointed out, they are used as independent words.
Spelling rules for writing acronyms
There are spelling rules that must be observed when writing acronyms ... They are written without periods or blank spaces, that is, NATO, the exception occurs when they appear integrated in texts written in capital letters, in which case they must have periods; all the letters that compose them must be written in capital letters UNICEF. And whenever it can be done, the acronyms are Spanishized in the case of our language, such as the UN.
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