 For Authors: August 08, 2018 Issue [#9041] |
  For Authors
This week: D. N. W. I. A. Edited by: NaNoNette  
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Dear Authors,
I am NaNoNette and I will be your guest editor for this issue. |
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D. N. W. I. A.
What does D. N. W. I. A. stand for?
It means: Do Not Write In Acronyms.
But why not? Doesn't everybody know what the CIA, the FBI, and NEST stand for?
Actually, they don't. Even when you think it's perfectly obvious.
CIA can stand for "Central Intelligence Agency (US government)", or "Certified Internal Auditor", or "Culinary Institute of America (Hyde Park, New York)"
FBI can stand for "Federal Bureau of Investigation (US government)", or "Frame Buffer Image", or "Food Borne Illness"
NEST can stand for "Nuclear Emergency Search Team", or "NanoEngineering Science and Technology", or "Naval Exercise Support Terminal"
As you see, each of those acronyms has many meanings. Many more than I listed here. I chose three meanings to illustrate that an acronym can't stand alone in a fiction text. Now, of course if you've already described an agent environment with secretive meetings about the going ons at black sites, then it is pretty likely the reader will know which CIA you mean when you write it just like that.
However, are you really doing your writing a service by letting readers assume? No.
Treat your reader as if they have never walked a single step in your shoes. As if they know nothing at all (except reading.) If you are writing for an audience of even one person who does not spend every single day with you and has lengthy conversations with you, you have to assume that they do not know what it is you're talking about. It doesn't matter how many years you have been certain that a certain acronym describes a certain disease, government agency, or technology.
I can only speak for myself, but when I read a text that keeps referring back to some acronym, yet it's never spelled out what it actually means, I will just exit the text. I once ran a contest where an author kept mentioning the acronym for some terrible disease. In my review, (since it was a contest I couldn't just leave the text) I told the author that I did not know what that ailment was and this was so distracting the whole time that I ended up not getting into the plot or story at all.
The author was deeply offended and sent me a scathing reply that the acronym was well known. In that scathing reply, the author kept using the acronym. I don't know, to this day, what the disease was. Total waste of my and the author's time.
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I got the following replies to my for my last For Authors newsletter "Learn on Writing.Com"
Apondia  wrote: This was a really good idea. I actually never thought of getting some of my facts at writing.com but I will use this idea regularly now. Kudos. from Apondia
Thank you for reading and commenting. I have found some good information right here too.
Quick-Quill  wrote: Thank you for pointing that out. I'd never done that search and now find quite an interesting plethora of subjects.
Yes, it is surprising how much knowledge all of us have posted here on the site. |
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