Hi, English isn’t my mother tongue so I was asking myself that question since I first encounted a w/… Back then I was like: “What tf does ‘w slash’ stand for?” And when I found out I was like “How, why, and is it any intuitive?” But I never dared to ask that until now
All in all, the / is just one style of abbreviation used in English. It’s not only used for “with”, but also a few other words (w/o = without, N/A = not applicable).
In German we abbreviate using a dot (e.g. “m.” = “mit” = "with). That’s not more or less intuitive, it’s just what you are used to.
What’s kinda special with English is that there are multiple abbreviation styles. Off the top of my head I can think of six styles:
- Abbreviate random parts of words using a slash: “N/A”, “w/”, “w/o”
- Abbreviate keeping only the first letter of a word using a dot: “e.g.”
- Abbreviate keeping the first and some random later consonants (and sometimes consonants that aren’t in the word at all) without using punctuation: Dr, Mr, Ms, Mrs
- Abbreviate using acronyms and no punctuation: BBC
- Abbreviate using acronyms and dots: B.C.
- Abbreviate by substituting parts of the word with a single letter: Xmas (Christmas), Xing (Crossing)
I’m used to Dr., Mr., Mrs. all needing the dot.
I’d also add the medical ones which all use x, and most use the first letter of the word, but not all, so it’s kinda point 3, kinda not:
- Prescription: rx
- Symptoms: sx
- Diagnosis: dx
- History: hx
I learned similar shorthand from an accountant, who wrote transfer (money transfer between accounts) as tx.
Also, it used to be obligatory to put the dot on Mr., Mrs., Dr., etc. I’m old, I remember how it was taught. And we called those dots “periods”. I haven’t been in school in decades, but I’ve been noticing those dots disappearing.
Both are possible: Dr and Dr.
Never heard of the x version. Very interresting.
In programmer lingo we’ll sometimes shorten words with the number of letters in between:
i18n (internationalization) and L10n (localization). I just learned of g11n (globalization), too.
This one is terrible IMO. A11y is ironically very inaccessible unless you’re aware of this unintuitive system.
Now that I know it though, it’s a good way to distinguish between similar common abbreviations. For instance I know you don’t mean “Actually” even though I’m not sure what you do mean by A11y.
Dr., Mrs., Ms. etc. are traditionally abbreviated with periods/dots but it does raise issues typing on one’s phone because autocorrect thinks it’s the end of a sentence, so sans dots is becoming more common. And there’s other examples which have never had dots, like nvm and af
X is a little special, it stands for Cross and therefore also for Christ. When illiterate medieval people had to sign documents they were told to make the sign of the Cross, since they were usually swearing
Edit: anyone else always pronounce PED XING as pedexing instead of pedestrian crossing?
As a non-Christian, I never made that Xmas connection. It sounds cool, but I was never sure why anyone started calling that (and evidently never curious enough to go looking for an answer or even really ask, I just kinda took it as one of those things that is how it is because people are going to people).
As a non-Christian, I never made that Xmas connection.
Well, as a Christian, I wouldn’t feel bad about it because the poster is not correct. The X in Xmas does not stand for a cross, it comes from the Greek spelling of Christ which is Χριστός. The chi-rho symbol (☧) is an imposition of the first two letters (Χ and ρ) and is still commonly used to refer to Christ in some denominations.
As a bonus: if you’ve ever wondered (or not wondered) why some Christian symbolism uses a fish, ἸΧΘΥΣ (or ICTHYS) is an acronym for Ἰησοῦς Χρῑστός Θεοῦ Υἱός Σωτήρ, “which translates into English as ‘Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior’.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichthys) This has been used since the first century.
When you type Dr., et al., you normally follow it with a proper noun. Why is the auto caps an issue?
For instance, if you want to text someone “I have an appointment with the Dr. at 11 on Tuesday”. Depending on the dr’s name it might be more to type than someone cares to, especially if it isn’t the most pertinent piece of information.
Because, as you probably just noticed, it’s sometimes part of a sentence, used without the name. Maybe I’m texting “Dr says it’s not a tumor, I’m pregnant” or something.
In addition, Dr (w/ or w/o .) sometimes means Drive, and USPS sorting machines prefer no dots, so that might also drive autotype to choose dotless, or at least offer it.
… I think it’s actually a Latin word, “re,”, meaning, “the matter (subject)” not an abbreviation at all.
yeah this is a real pet peeve of mine.
In German many people, web mailers and also sometimes even email software use “AW:” (short for AntWort) instead of “Re:” and then some of them don’t even recognize the existence of a previous “AW:” or “Re:” giving you such wondrous email subjects as: “AW: Re: AW: Re: AW: AW: Re: AW: Re: really important subject” 🤦
Bonus points for one of your examples being e.g. which stands for exempli gratia, translating to “for example”
Which is kinda weird in it self, because when abbreviating you not only change the words but even the language.
Hardly anyone would ever write “exempli gratia” in a normal text, and “f.e.” would also not be understandible for most people.
So in regular use, “e.g.” is practically the abbreviation for “for example”
True, but we have lots of examples of that in English, to the point where I don’t think it’s that weird. e.g., i.e., b.c., a.d., etc., and so on. What’s even weirder to me is that we have sayings in English that use words that are otherwise not used anymore. “To and fro”, “lo and behold”, “eke out”, “inclement weather” (it’s hard to even find a definition of inclement because it’s only used to describe weather), “spick and span”, “days of yore”
Abbreviate keeping the first and some random later consonants (and sometimes consonants that aren’t in the word at all) without using punctuation: Dr, Mr, Ms, Mrs
I think it’s usually the first letter(s) and the last letter(s). In older English handwritings I’ve come across M.ʳ etc. So I think that’s were those came from.
In the Speedwriting shorthand system, developed in 1924 for use with typewriter, / Is used to denote omitted sylables, so ‘with’ becomes w/ and ‘without’ becomes w/o. Here is a pretty deep guide on the precepts of Speedwriting:
But shouldn’t “w/o” then be written as “w/o/”?
And “N/A” omits more than one sylable in “applicable”.
I guess it’s a grown system.
Abbreviate using the first and then any choice of following letter that differentiates it from the other possibilities in a specific group: AL, AR, AK, AZ… MA, ME, MD, MI, MN, MS, MO, MT… WA, WI, WV, WY!
Well tbf those are post codes designed by the postal service to represent states. I wouldn’t really count it as a naturally developed abbreviation like the ones above, it’s no different from .fr, .es, .co.uk, etc.
The abbreviations for states used before the two-letter ones, however, are much weirder! E.g. Penna. for Pennsylvania
Both versions exist: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_(title)#Abbreviation
m. is not a German abbreviation for mit, afaik. I never once read that. Where did you get that from?
As an Austrian, I have often seen it on food packaging with limited space. Something like “Rotkraut m. Apfel”.
Wikipedia at least sees initialisms as a type of acronyms. But even if it didn’t, your comment would still be unhelpful pedantry.
As others said, with as w/ was around as part of secretarial shorthand, which got taught to most people keeping corporate documentation and it stuck.
There are a lot of abbreviations like that in the English language that came from abbreviations in written form due to the media in was written in, whether it was newspapers, telegraph, handwritten shorthand, or computer based. It may not make sense because English isn’t a language designed to make sense; it isn’t even designed.
It may not make sense because English isn’t a language designed to make sense; it isn’t even designed.
To be fair, no living language is.
French is heavily managed by the Académie, I guess it depends how you interpret “designed”. English is a much freer language that morphs and absorbs terms from many languages.
Pretty sure it started w/your mom
Some various answers here; but for me, it came from w/o as a shorthand for ‘without’, then I started sometimes writing w/ for ‘with’ and wondering if that’s okay!
I’m not a linguist, but to me, langauge is fluid, in that it’s fine to use it any way you want, so long as the people involved can interpret it as intended.
Which means when you write a note in shorthand for yourself, so long as you can come back to it and decipher it at whatever point you need it then it’s fine.
If someone were to happen to come across it then there is a concern that they may interpret it wrong. As a silly example: If “I will fuck your mom” was your code for “I will pick up milk and eggs from the grocery store”, you can see how people (which could include you later) can interpret your message incorrectly, and you should pick a better shorthand in that case.
When communicating with others you’ll have contexts of what kind of things are relevant, like PoS may mean different things if you are talking to a store manager vs. your buddy, you have to be sure your listener or reader gets the correct version.
In spanish we use the same abbreviation: c/ for “with” ans s/ for “without”
