A backronym or bacronym is a phrase constructed after the fact to make an existing word or words into an acronym. Backronyms may be invented with serious or humorous intent, or may be a type of false or folk etymology.
The word is understood as a portmanteau combining back and acronym. Its earliest known citation in print is "bacronym" in the November 1983[1] edition of the Washington Post monthly neologism contest (1983–2004): journalist Bob Levey quoted winning reader "Meredith G. Williams of Potomac" defining it as the "same as an acronym, except that the words were chosen to fit the letters."[1] Actual use of the word is found in texts since at least 1994.[1]
[edit]Backronym versus acronym
An acronym is a word derived from the initial letters of a phrase:[2] For example, the word radar comes from "Radio Detection and Ranging."[3]
By contrast, a backronym is constructed by taking an existing word already in common usage, and creating a new phrase using the letters in the word as the initial letters of the words in the phrase. For example, the United States Department of Justice assigns to their Amber Alert program the meaning "America's Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response."[3], although the term originally referred to Amber Hagerman, a 9-year old abducted and murdered in Texas in 1996.
The idea that a backronym, like an acronym, is a pronounceable word is sometimes broken, even by dictionaries providing examples such as DVD(an initialism)[4] and SOS (a representation of the emergency signal used in Morse code).[5]
