a word formed from the initial letters or groups of letters of words in a set phrase or series of words, as WAC from Women's Army Corps, OPEC from Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or loran from long-range navigation.
Regardless of which side of the debate you subsribe to with respect to true acronyms being pronounceable as a word as opposed to simply spelling out the letters (eg. NATO vs FBI), there is little disagreement that only the most successful acronyms become accepted as normal words in the dictionary, eg. laser or scuba.
A spin on this concept, either for comedic effect or for assistance with memorising a sequence, is the backronym. This is where an acronym is reverse engineered from an ordinary word.
Example 1: the next time you ask someone how they are and they respond "fine", you may want to question whether they really mean "Frightfully Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional" (and that's a clean version).
Example 2: the internet has helped to propagate the myth that golf is a sexist sport and was originated from the acronym "Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden".
Do you have any examples of backronyms that you'd care to share?
