“Ad fontes!”
UK, 1972—the offence of taking a car without the owner’s consent, especially for the purpose of joyriding, which was a social phenomenon prevalent in north-eastern England—acronym for ‘taking without owner’s consent’
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USA, 1983—an acronym deliberately formed from a phrase whose initial letters spell out a particular word or words, either to enhance memorability or as a fanciful explanation of a word’s origin—blend of the adjective ‘back’ and of the noun ‘acronym’
Read MoreUK, 2005—the perceived indiscriminate and excessive use by the authorities of anti-social behaviour orders—apparently coined by Álvaro Gil-Robles, the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights—‘Asbo’: acronym from the initial letters of ‘anti-social behaviour order’
Read More1970—British and Irish English—acronym from the phrase ‘all coppers are bastards’—customarily written (tattooed in particular) rather than spoken
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‘Wags’ (2002): the wives and girlfriends of the England World Cup football team—‘Gwags’ (2006): golfers’ wives and girlfriends
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USA, 1984—the Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony awards viewed as a single achievement—coined by U.S. actor and musician Philip Michael Thomas
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UK, 1992 (coined by Terence Blacker)—a novel depicting the lives and concerns of the British rural middle classes—from the association of Aga cookers with those classes
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USA, 1979—acronym from ‘not in my back yard’—first used in ‘the Nimby syndrome’ with reference to the disposal of nuclear waste
Read MoreUSA, 1956—acronym from ‘white Anglo-Saxon Protestant’—‘Wasp’, or ‘WASP’: a person who belongs to, or is thought of, as being part of a white, upper middle-class, northern European, Protestant group that dominates economic, political and cultural activity in the USA
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early 21st century—acronym from ‘Completely Automatic Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart’, with punning allusion to ‘capture’ and ‘gotcha’
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word histories 