The Acronymous Society

Once upon a time, Americans were just Republicans, Democrats, Elks or Masons. Now they back ACTION (American Council to Improve Our Neighborhoods) and CARE (Cooperative for American Relief Everywhere) and SHARE (Share Happily and Reap Endlessly) and TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly). Unionists support COPE (Committee on Political Education). Negroes support CORE (Congress of Racial Equality). In Little Rock, moderates stayed on the school board through STOP (Stop This Outrageous Purge). In New Orleans, they faced up to integration with SOS (Save Our Schools). In Atlanta this fall, moderates will do likewise through HOPE (Help Our Public Education) and OASIS (Organizations Assisting Schools in September)--if they can outwit GUTS (Georgians Unwilling to Surrender).

WAIF & SAFE. H. L. Mencken called attention to the native U.S. talent for "reducing complex concepts to starkest abbreviations." From O.K. to K.O., Americans have long coined initial-born words. But what began as playful sport has turned into contagion and verbal smog (smoke and fog). Just to describe the new rash of alphabetease, linguists were forced to invent a new word: acronym (from the Greek akros for tip, onyma for name), which first appeared in dictionaries in 1947. Most insidious breeders are public relations experts, adept at spawning the punch word that sums up an organization, then, to fit its letters, turning out an often fatuous full title. Examples: WAIF (Women's Adoption International Fund) and the recently launched piggyback acronym YOU (Youth Out for UNICEF). Last week Mississippi segregationists coined yet another: SAFE, meaning Southern Action for Expansion.

More blight than bright, the new acronyms are a kind of regression. They do not really enrich the language because they are words already. Still, they cap a fine old tradition that probably began with the Romans' SPQR (Senatus Populusque Romanus). Britons in the 19th century, for example, contributed posh (port out, starboard home), a way to remember the breeze-cooled side on Indiabound ships. Acronyms first picked up speed in World War I with such coinages as Anzac, for Australia and New Zealand Army Corps, AWOL, for absent without official leave, and asdic (Allied Submarine Detection Investigation Committee), which eventually led to the development of sonar (sound navigation ranging).

Dear Little Nira. U.S. companies were meanwhile calling themselves Alcoa (Aluminum Co. of America) or Nabisco (National Biscuit Co.) or Socony (Standard Oil Co. of New York). After the advent of Basic (British American Scientific International Commercial) English, acronyms faltered in favor of the New Deal's AAA, CCC, TVA, WPA, led by F.D.R. himself. Indeed, legend has it that the death of the National Industrial Recovery Act (ruled unconstitutional) left bereft of rhyme or reason a host of Depression-born U.S. girls named Nira.

What brought the acronym to full glory was World War II, when G.I.s peppered their language with officialese. A few days after Pearl Harbor, CINCUS (Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet), pronounced sink-us, hurriedly became COMINCH. The U.S. Navy then went flat out to become the world's champion of agglutination. The result was seldom BOLTOP (better on lips than on paper), as British soldiers used to scribble on the envelopes of their letters home. Though it produced the comely WAVES (Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service), more often Usnavese sounded like a convention of inebriated Welsh politicians mumbling such jawbreakers as COMSUPFORSO-WESPAC (Commander, Support Force, Southwest Pacific) and COMSERFOR-SOPACSUBCOM (Commander, Service Force, South Pacific Subordinate Command). For sheer sesquipedalia, the Navy's only real rival was EIDEBOWA-BEW (Economic Intelligence Division of the Enemy Branch of the Office of Economic Warfare Analysis of the Board of Economic Warfare).

MANIAC & MISHAP. Nor was the enemy silent. The Germans contributed Nazi (Nazional-Sozialist) and Gestapo (Geheime Staatspolizei), along with flak, a heaven-sent shortening of fliegerabwehr-kanone (cannon to ward off airplane attacks). World War II permanently enriched the language with Jeep (from GP, for general purpose vehicle) and radar (radio detecting and ranging). It also bequeathed the splendidly expressive snafu (debawdlerized to situation normal, all fouled up), which by war's end had built up to a crescendo of comparatives, from fumtu (fouled up more than usual), tarfu (things are really fouled up), fubb (fouled up beyond belief), fubar (fouled up beyond all recognition), janfu (joint Army-Navy foul-up), commfu (complete utter monumental military foul-up), sapfu (surpassing all previous foulups) to tuifu (the ultimate in foul-ups).

The ultimate in acronyms is nowhere in sight in a day when even Job is called J.B. and American Indians have been reduced to Amerinds. Across the Formosa Straits, CHINAT glares at CHICOM; in South Viet Nam's jungle, the Communist Viet Cong sneers at the My-Diem (meaning Diem Yankees). "A-OK," snaps NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration); proud NATO christens SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander, Europe), along with such satrapies as FLAGCENT and SUSREP-NADPB.

Sometimes protesters call a halt: in 1952 Secretary of Defense Robert Lovett refused to be known as SOD. But still, tuifus abound, from CRAB (California Raisin Advisory Board) and IDIOT (Instrumentation Digital On-Line Transcriber) to MANIAC (Mathematical Analyzer, Numerical Integrater and Calculator), MISHAP (Missiles High-Speed Assembly Program) and WAGGS (World Association of Girl Guides and Scouts).

It is too late a day in the acronymous society to believe that Miami's "Come and live in Florida" society just happens to spell CALIF, or that San Francisco's Gas Appliance Society's initials are fortuitous. A standout like San Francisco's Go Club is almost too good to last. Its president is Ben Liang Go, and all its members are named Go. That's all.

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