Dictionary

deabbreviate en · VERB

Etymology

From de- + abbreviate.

Meanings

1. (rare) To expand (an abbreviation).
   • Simplified Main Stress Rule in Deabbreviated Form 1973, Alvin L. Gregg, Capturing Native Intuitions: A Criticism of the Chomsky-Halle Auxiliary Reduction Rules:
   • I was asked to “deabbreviate the following,” which I did not understand until they pointed out the acronyms listed on the sheet below. 2015, Robert B. Munson, Peacekeeping in South Sudan: One Year of Lessons from Under the Blue Beret, New York, N.Y.: Palgrave Macmillan, →ISBN:
   • Deabbreviating means replacing an abbreviated name with a more understandable "natural" one consisting of whole English words. To deabbreviate, we "generate-and-test": We select candidates and abbreviate them various ways, trying to obtain a match with a given abbreviation. 1994 March, Neil C. Rowe, Kari Laitinen, Semiautomatic Deabbreviation of Source Programs, Monterey, Calif.: Naval Postgraduate School, page 4:
   • To me there is no better way to define the slums than what the authors have done by deabbreviating SLUM (‘Sombre life of underprivileged mankind’). 1999, A[hmed] Mushtaque R[aza] Chowdhury, “Foreword”, in AKM Ahsan Ullah, Abdar Rahman, Munira Murshed, Poverty and Migration: Slums of Dhaka City: The Realities, Dhaka: Association for Rural Development and Studies, →ISBN, page 7:
   • STP […] Probably coined as an abbreviation of ‘serotonin triphosphate’ and as an allusion to the trademark name of a motor oil additive, and later deabbreviated to ‘serenity, tranquillity and peace’. 2008, Tom Dalzell, Terry Victor, Vice Slang, Abingdon, Oxon; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN:
   • The first visualization construct is apt: it replaces three items (two arrows and the marker) by one item in a natural and clear-how-to-deabbreviate way. 2002, Data & Knowledge Engineering, page 11:
   • Eddy had sent two messages, and at the end of the second the service de-abbreviated his LOL. ‘P.S. Chateaubriand pls,’ the computer voice said. ‘Laughing Out Loud.’ 2013, Rosa Rankin-Gee, chapter 14, in The Last Kings of Sark, London: Virago Press, →ISBN, page 96:
   • What is NLP? Can it be any broader a title? Indeed, what is it? I don’t actually think it makes it any easier to “deabbreviate” it – its^([sic]) Neuro Linguistic Programming. 2007, Kirsty McKinnon, The Gift: A ‘How To’ for NLP with Real Life Experiences, Stanstead Abbotts, Herts.: MX Publishing Ltd, →ISBN, page 12:

Forms

Synonyms

unabbreviate