Using Acronyms and Abbreviations While Writing Content

When you've been in your field for a while, you'll notice that acronyms and abbreviations start coming into your daily voice. This is because you recognize what they portray in your industry and in your own business, and your coworkers will understand what you're saying. Acronyms and abbreviations are used in every aspect of life, from medicine to religion, but they can make document translation and other forms of localization more difficult.

But why do we use abbreviations and acronyms so frequently?

Using acronyms and abbreviations in daily speech facilitates and speeds up communication. I recognize this since we have a number of acronyms using a lot of abbreviations in the localization industry! Here are a few examples of abbreviations and acronyms we use:

1. It's much easier to talk (or write) about TEP for a PROJ than it is to spell out Translation, Editing, and Proofreading for a PROJ in emails, messages, and chats.

2. It's a lot easier to ask a colleague if an MKTG PROJ is appropriate for machine translation than it is to suggest Marketing Project for Machine Translation.

3. It's easier to ask an audio engineer if there's any OST in a video than it is to tell On Screen Text.

4. It's easier to submit a project for Quality Assurance than it is to submit it for Quality Control.

Why Is It a Good Idea to Avoid Acronyms?

A pronounceable word formed often (but not always) from the original words of a descriptive name or title is called an acronym (from Latin acro- meaning "beginning" + -onym meaning "word, name"). Although these behaviors may be acceptable within your own company, avoiding acronyms is a must but if you're a professional writer considering writing global content that would be released (such as technical guides, manuals for usage, simple reference guides, protocols, submissions, and so on). 

Since it is uncommon, if not impossible, for an acronym to translate well into another language. The more widely used acronyms, such as International Organization for Standardization (ISO), are an exception, but most acronyms do not translate well. When writing material for translation, using acronyms and abbreviations has a number of drawbacks, the most serious of which is the loss of the original sense of your writing. When using an abbreviation or acronym for the first time, you can write out the full sense of the abbreviation or acronym, along with the acronym itself in parentheses.

Why is it a Bad Idea to Use Abbreviations?

An abbreviation is a condensed version of a word or phrase. For example, the abbreviation abbr stands for abbreviation and lmao meaning in texting is laughing my ass off.  Even if not as difficult as acronyms, using an abbreviation instead of full words has a number of drawbacks, particularly when dealing with the English language. English is a highly nuanced language that is difficult to master on its own. Since translators do not operate from abbreviations, adding abbreviations to your global content muddies the waters even further. They'll need all of the vocabulary to make sure they're on the right track. If you write the word prob, it may mean a variety of things, and the context can make it difficult to figure out what you're talking about.

1. Prob means "likely,""probable,""probable,""probation," or "proboscis." Although some of these are clearly avoidable, others are not. It will take time (and money) for the translator to come up with the correct explanation of the problem.

2. Profit Margin, Product Manager, Project Manager, and Program Manager are all examples of PM. The translator can remove certain choices depending on the context, but it will be hard to determine which is the right one.

For a translator to understand what you're trying to mean, you'll need to use words rather than acronyms or abbreviations. Letters can mean a lot of different things on their own. By avoiding acronyms and abbreviating terms, the meaning of the term or expression becomes much simpler and easier to interpret, which will save you money because the number of errors will be reduced. When it comes to pronouncing, punctuating, and pluralizing the different types of abbreviations, both native and non-native English students may get confused. It can be difficult to tell when to pronounce the abbreviation's individual letters and when to pronounce it as a whole phrase. 

When using the indefinite articles ‘a' or ‘an' before an initialism (or any other abbreviation in which each individual letter is pronounced), keep in mind that the abbreviation's initial tone, not its spelling, determines which article to use. While the letter ‘a' would usually come before the letter ‘m,' the article ‘an' would be used instead of the initialism ‘MP3' since the initial sound is /ɛ/ rather than /m/.