An acronym is what you call a word form from the initial letters of other words. NASA is the acronym we use for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. BOGO means “buy one, get one.” They’re pretty common in everyday life. But less common are backronyms – when you take an already existing word and then use each letter as an initial for something else, essentially reverse engineering your acronym.
Sometimes these are done to be funny, and the military has a habit of doing it a lot to make things sound cool and catchy. But they pop up other places as well, sometimes with people making them up just because they think they have to exist, even when they don’t.
10. RPG isn’t Rocket-Propelled Grenade
RPG is a term most gamers are familiar with, as well as anyone with a penchant for military history and armaments. Look it up on Wikipedia and it tells you that rocket-propelled grenade is often abbreviated as RPG. And while it’s true people say that, it’s not true that RPG means “rocket-propelled grenade.” That was a backronym we created in the English-speaking world for an already existing term in Russian.
RPG comes from the Russian term “Ruchnoy Protivotankoviy Granatomet.” Translated to English, that means “handheld antitank grenade launcher” which is basically a rocket-propelled grenade which is why the backronym is so rarely questioned. But it’s kind of like when you find out that a zipper is not really the generic name for a thing, it’s just the name everyone uses because that’s what they’re used to hearing.
9. Wi-Fi Doesn’t Mean Anything
Back in the day, if you were in the market for a stereo, you better believe you wanted one with Hi-Fi. Hi-Fi meant “high fidelity” and in music, that means your stereo could reproduce sounds with crystal clarity. No distortion and no loss of sound quality from your records or 8-tracks or whatever you were listening to. Music has gone through so many changes since the 1950s when the term first appeared it’s hard to even put your finger on what Hi-Fi means anymore. But at least the definition is clear. Hi-Fi means high fidelity. So what does Wi-Fi mean?
Most people today will use wi-fi to mean “internet” or, specifically, wireless internet. Businesses will have signs on the wall saying “free Wi-Fi” or letting you know the Wi-Fi is for customers only. The term is actually a trademark of something called the Wi-Fi Alliance, so a product can’t technically be sold that uses the term Wi-Fi without their say so.
The term came about in 1999 when the Wi-Fi Alliance wanted a term they could use that sounded better than what wi-fi actually is, which is IEEE 802.11b Direct Sequence. They hired a consulting firm who came up with the name. It’s two syllables, it’s easy to remember, and it sounds vaguely techy. Kind of like Hi-Fi. But it means absolutely nothing. So even though people have tried to apply a backronym to it, one of the most popular being “wireless fidelity” based on our Hi-Fi example, and even a few others like “wireless finder” or even “with internet friends are invited,” none of them are true.
8. Zbtb7 was Given the Backronym Pokemon But Not for Long
You’ve probably never discussed Zbtb7 in casual conversation for any number of reasons. First, it’s a gene that is known to cause cancer, so it’s not the sort of thing most of us are talking about at the best of times. It’s a morbid subject and also highly specialized, since the names of individual genes are not something widely known among the population. Another reason is that it’s gone through some name changes before it got to that mishmash of letters and a number that it is right now.
Once upon a time, researchers from the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, the kind of people who do need to discuss cancer genes by name, used a different name to refer to it. They called it Pokemon. That was a backronym the team came up with because the formal name of the gene was POK erythroid myeloid ontogenic gene, or POKEMO gene. Close enough, right?
Pokemon certainly is easier to say than the full name and a little more user friendly than Zbtb7 as well. Unfortunately, the people who actually make Pokemon didn’t see the lighter side of naming a cancer-causing gene after their lighthearted cartoon. Pokemon USA threatened to sue if the name wasn’t changed and it seems like the cancer researchers weren’t committed enough to the joke, so they changed it to the more mundane name we have now.
7. The FBI Created Their Own Motto as a Backronym
The FBI, as an organization, already is an acronym, so it’s weird that they have a backronym in their identity now as well. The organization came into being back in 1908 and it was called the Bureau of Investigation at the time. In 1932, it became the United States Bureau of Investigation and shortly thereafter it was officially dubbed the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
As with many organizations like the CIA, the NSA or the DOD, the FBI is chiefly known by the initials but the full name is easy enough to remember and give voice to if need be. But when they adopted the official name in 1935, they also took up a motto that was printed on their official seal, which was “fidelity, bravery, integrity.”
The bureau of investigation part of their name was already nearly 30 years old at the time. The adoption of a motto, which was all well and good, seems a little performative in retrospect, however, since it was shoehorned into their initials as a backronym after the name was already established.
6. The APGAR Score for Newborns is a Backronym
When babies are born, they are sometimes subjected to something called an APGAR test to gauge their overall health at the time of birth. It’s typically conducted within the first five minutes. APGAR is an acronym that stands for Appearance, Pulse, Grimace, Activity, Respiration. Appearance deals with skin tone, so the doctor wants to make sure the child isn’t turning blue or yellow or another color that is not indicative of good health. Pulse is obvious and deals with heart rate. Grimace refers to proper reflex action, activity relates to muscle tone and respiration is, of course, breathing.
There’s a scale doctors can use to gauge each one of these elements that ranges from two down to zero. Two is optional, one may represent problems, and zero indicates something that definitely needs to be addressed. A zero on the appearance rating would indicate the child turning blue. Zero on pulse means no pulse at all.
So far, this all seems fine and normal, so where does the backronym apply? The test was developed in 1952 by Dr. Virginia Apgar. She developed a backronym out of her own name to account for the features that were important to look for in a newborn to assess its health, at least in terms of heart rate and breathing.
5. The Jesus Fish is a Clever Early Backronym
Most of us have seen a Jesus Fish before, typically affixed to the rear of a car, though they can be placed and used literally anywhere. For most of us, it’s a simple symbol that conveys the person who is using it considers themselves a Christian. If you’ve ever stopped to think about it, you’ve probably at least related the idea of fish to Jesus in terms of the story of Jesus turning one fish into many. It all seems pretty reasonable in terms of biblical tales. But there is more to it than meets the eye.
The Greek word for fish is “ichthys,” and this was made into an acrostic by early Christians. An acrostic is like an acronym, in which the first letter of every line of something like a poem spells out a word. In this case, ichthys came to represent Iesous Christos Theou Yios Soter. Translate that to English and you get Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.
The use of the fish as a symbol for Jesus goes all the way back to the first century. Back in the day, Christians were not always looked upon kindly, so representing yourself as one to others was a risky business. The use of the fish symbol allowed for a secret way for Christians to identify one another. The symbol had already been used in other cultures and with other beliefs, so it would be looked upon with less suspicion than other Christian symbols. In time, the original acronym was dropped altogether and the symbol of the fish became synonymous with Jesus as a kind of backronym.
4. The International Magazine of Events
TIME Magazine began publishing in 1923. For a long while, it was one of the most influential and important news magazines in the world. While the magazine and news media have changed considerably in the last century, Time’s influence is still relevant. But something more questionable is the nature of the magazine’s name.
It’s been said that TIME is an acronym, and that’s why the name is capitalized. The acronym in question is “The International Magazine of Events.” And yes, that does fit, but there’s no evidence that this is an acronym at all and, if it’s to be accepted in any way, it must be a backronym.
There is no mention in TIME archives of the name of the magazine being an acronym at all. The earliest reference to the acronym only dates to 2007. Despite the fact that TIME didn’t even create it, they’re happy to use the backronym on their own website.
3. NASA Named a Treadmill in Honor of Stephen Colbert
Sometimes the best reason to create a backronym is for a joke and that’s what NASA did with a treadmill, of all things. Back in 2010, NASA held a contest to allow the public to name a room on the space station. They had four suggestions which were very NASA-type words, but they let people write in their own ideas. The idea was hijacked by Stephen Colbert, whose fans wrote his name in enough to allow Colbert to become the winning entry.
NASA took things in stride and stated that they were not going to name the whole room after Stephen Colbert, but he was going to get a consolation prize. Instead of the room, there is a piece of equipment now known as the COLBERT, which stands for Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill. Astronauts need to engage in a lot of exercise in space due to the lack of gravity, so now astronauts will use the COLBERT treadmill to stay in shape.
2. SOS Has Never Meant Anything
Arguably the most famous acronym in the world, pretty much everyone has heard of SOS. It was developed in 1905 by Germany after several years of countries recognizing that ships in distress required a common and efficient method to signal for help anywhere in the world that would transcend language barriers. SOS was developed for morse code and the reason those letters were chosen was for the sake of simplicity and clarity. In code, “S” is represented by three dots in a row, which are made by quick taps on the telegraph machine. “O” is represented by three dashes, which are longer taps.
At the time SOS was proposed, the letters were not even considered. It was simply dot, dot dot, dash, dash, dash, dot dot dot. It was easy to understand and not likely to ever be mistaken for anything else.
Because when people hear it today and see it in print, it’s easily recognized as not being a word. That has led to speculation about what it must stand for and “save our ship” is often cited as the answer. That said, it was never intended to have any meaning whatsoever so “save our ship” or “save our souls” or any other potential meanings are just incorrect backronyms applied long after the fact.
1. An Atmospheric Phenomenon was Named STEVE
Have you ever been far enough north to see the Northern Lights and seen an arc of purple light streaking through the atmosphere? If so, you saw STEVE. STEVE stands for Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement and is the name given to the rare atmospheric phenomenon by photographer Chris Ratzlaff, who suggested it thanks to the animated movie Over the Hedge.
STEVE had been photographed for decades, but no one knew what it was. Something called a proton arc was suggested, but that didn’t fit. STEVE fit the bill because, in the movie, the characters use the word to mean “something unknown.” A backronym was developed and, so far, it has stuck.
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A little known and limited use aircraft planning, status, and tracking software was developed for local use. One of the folks developing it announced to all interested parties that “This feels like getting fishslapped!!” They never named it so it was referred as “Fishslap” when in use or training. Over time, when asked, We explained that it means: Flight Information SHaring Services, Logistics, And Planning. Surprisingly accurate.