Education has changed significantly since I was in elementary school. In those days the curriculum focused on the 3 ‘R’s “Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic”. Teachers spent lots of time on subjects like grammar and penmanship. They also put lots of emphasis on spelling. Each week they issued a new list of spelling words and there was always a weekly test. There were school-wide and even district-wide spelling bees. The closest thing we had to spell check was a dictionary and you had to have a pretty good idea of how a word was spelled in order to look it up.
In the 2010 things have changed significantly. Word processing programs have built-in tools that can check spelling and even grammar. Imagine that!
Lately it seems that our English language is overrun with abbreviations and acronyms. It is quite chic to shorten names of establishments, publications and even celebrities.
- The Treasure Island Hotel is now simply “TI”
- National Geographic is now “Nat Geo”
- Even the long-running television soap opera One Life to Live is now OLTL
Even celebrities are getting into the act.
- Jennifer Lopez – J.Lo
- Alal Iverson – AI
- Alex Rodriguez – A-Rod
- Kevin Federline – K-Fed
Christians are asking each other WWJD (What would Jesus Do?)
Now I’ve begun to question – did I waste all of those years honing my spelling and grammar skills? Who knew that in 2010 it would no longer be necessary to speak proper English or even spell words correctly? And who sets the standards for all of these acronyms? According to Wikipedia, there is no universal agreement on the precise definition or written usage of these abbreviations. So I guess it’s just anything goes. Even frequently used acronyms can have more than one meaning. For example LOL is often used to mean “laughing out loud”, but it can also mean “lots of luck”, “lots of laughs: or even” little old lady”. ROFL is “rolling on floor laughing” but can also mean “running on four legs”. It’s crazy! Where are the grammar police? Oh well, if I can’t beat ‘em I’ll just have to join ‘em. From now on, I’ll just make up abbreviations at will. I’ll have my own set of acronyms.
Here are a few examples:
- ONSD (Oh no she didn’t)
- DMMCDT (don’t make me come down there)
- YLA (you look amazing)
- DTMMLF (does this make me look fat)
- YMNKBM (you must not know ‘bout me)
- FINTNF (fifty is not the new forty)
It will be along and ever-changing list. Of course no one will have any idea of what I’m saying, but I’ll be communicating! LOL!
#1 by Rhonda on May 25, 2010 - 2:22 pm
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Well who da thunk?!! Loved this, I was such a good speller back in the day, I used to win those spelling contests and be close to the last one standing! Now I can hardly read my own handwriting as I am always typing on a keyboard so am out of practice! It’s funny – but I hope we continue to communicate no matter how we do it, we still need to express ourselves to each other. By the way I like the idea of fifty being the new forty! FITNF! LOL!! I like your new acronyms!
#2 by Rhonda on May 25, 2010 - 2:25 pm
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Well who da thunk?!! Loved this, I was such a good speller back in the day, I used to win those spelling contests and be the last one standing! Now I can hardly read my own handwriting as I am always typing on a keyboard so am out of practice! It’s funny – but I hope we continue to communicate no matter how we do it, we still need to express ourselves to each other. By the way I like the idea of fifty being the new forty! FITNF! LOL!! I like your new acronyms!
#3 by Gloria Eagan on May 25, 2010 - 2:41 pm
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YCMU (you crack me up)