![]() ![]() In these documents, using a few abbreviations in succession isn’t necessarily a problem. In very technical writing, for instance, you might expect to see more acronyms and initialisms. Clarity is the key factor here, so keep the intended purpose and audience of the document in mind. When proofreading, you should always make sure that abbreviations are defined clearly and used consistently (in line with your client’s chosen style guide, where applicable).īut you might also need to look out for passages like the one above, where a pile-up of acronyms or initialisms could be problematic. What to Do with Alphabet Soup when Proofreading As such, it is something to be aware of when working for clients in these areas. Academic and business documents are particularly prone to this. Nowadays, people use it more broadly to refer to any writing dense with abbreviations. This sense of “alphabet soup” was popularized by an American politician called Al Smith, who said that the number of three-letter agency names used by the US Government made it look like “absent-minded professors” were playing “anagrams with alphabet soup.” However, using several abbreviations in succession makes the text potentially confusing, especially for anyone unfamiliar with the subject matter. ![]() ![]() The ATM handler, which is housed in the EFEM, will take a wafer from LPMA or LPMB to LLA or LLB, which is then picked by the TM robot and placed into one of the PMs.Īs long as the author has clearly introduced each abbreviation here, none would pose a problem by itself. In a proofreading context, though, this term refers to a pile-up of acronyms and initialisms that make text difficult to follow. ![]() When most people hear the term “alphabet soup,” they probably imagine alphabet-shaped pasta. What is alphabet soup in a writing context, though? And why is it a problem? In this post, we explain the basics and what to do if you encounter it in a document. But if there’s one literary meal that no editor or proofreader likes to see, it’s alphabet soup. A dedicated proofreader will have an appetite for all kinds of text. ![]()
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