QT 16 – Video Transcript and Bonus Info
Today’s QuickTake continues our discussion on abbreviations with a second quiz. Last time we discussed two types of abbreviations: acronyms and initialisms. An acronym is a word we create from the letters of other words, like MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving). An initialism is an abbreviation we pronounce one letter at a time, like FBI.
What happens when we need an article before these abbreviations? Do we use a or an? Select the correct article for the abbreviations: a or an
___ MADD meeting
___ MRI report
___ rap sheet
___ RV
___ FBI investigation
___ FedEx truck
___ SEC report
___ SWAT team
When do we use a and an anyway? Many people remember a rule from elementary school that they say goes like this:
Use a before a consonant. Use an before a vowel: a peach but an apple.
But is that the rule? No. Actually, the rule is to use a before a consonant sound and an before a vowel sound. The rule is auditory, not visual. We need to listen for the sound. Consider the word hour. Is it a hour or an hour? What sound do you hear? Since the h is silent, we hear a vowel sound, an hour. We don’t say a hour.
What about university? Is it a or an university? The word starts with a vowel, but what sound do we hear? We hear the consonant sound of y, as in yam. So we say a university. How about the word umbrella? Now we hear the vowel sound of u, so we say an umbrella.
Now let’s look at our quiz. What sound do we hear with each abbreviation?
MADD is an acronym, so we say a MADD meeting. But MRI is an initialism. When we say M, we hear emm, like egg. So we say an MRI report.
In the same way, we say a rap sheet, but an RV; an FBI investigation, but a FedEx truck; an SEC report, but a SWAT team.
When it comes to articles, looks are deceiving. So close your eyes and listen for the sound.
Here is the final quiz question for this QuickTake: is it a historic moment or an historic moment?
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The rest of the story:
Here is the answer to the question, is it a historic moment or an historic moment? Since the h is sounded (aspirated), a is the correct article: a historic moment.
Speaking of historic, does it mean the same thing as historical? Sometimes people use them interchangeably, but they are different words with different meanings.
Historic means something important or influential in history: historic treaties, historic houses, historic battles, historic dates, such as December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor Day.
Historical refers to anything from the past, important or not. A historical incident would be an incident in the past but not necessarily an important one. We read historical novels, watch historical movies, and compile historical data. There is nothing especially important about these items; if there were, they’d be historic. For example, the Gutenberg Bible is a historic book.
As William Safire puts it, “Any past event is historical, but only the most memorable ones are historic.”
What about a word like herb. In American English, the h is silent, so we would say an herb. But in British English, the h is pronounced, so they would say a herb. If we were to say herb with a pronounced h, we would be saying someone’s name: Herb!
Last, an abbreviation may have two acceptable pronunciations, for example, URL (which stands for uniform resource locator). When URL is pronounced one initial at a time (initialism), we would write a URL address. But when it is pronounced as a word (acronym), we would say an erl.