Apostrophes in Acronyms????

**zaphodeist** · 09 January 2012, 09:26 PM

"An" when the following word starts with a vowel

The word "nadder" means snake - or it did - "Look Cuthbert, there's a nadder!" This has now come to be "adder" - "Yes Fitzroy, it's an adder".

Just saying

**Drwyd** · 09 January 2012, 09:35 PM

An user ?

**handrawn** · 09 January 2012, 09:42 PM

you get half a cigar for that John the crucial letter is the first letter you pronounce so 'an 'istoric' [with silent 'h'] and 'a historic' have always been correct' and 'an historic' never has ... except by those with a misguided sense of the correct [which sadly includes many entrusted with education] an 'otel' ....yes 'an hotel'... never ! - my gran would have had a fit [mind you she was half french...]

**zaphodeist** · 09 January 2012, 09:47 PM

That's it!

**handrawn** · 09 January 2012, 10:05 PM

confusion probably arises from the written - when I was a lad you could write 'an hotel' and know that the h was understood to be silent in this particular instance if spoken [to write it with an apostrophe would have been considered naff] nowadays that is not the case, and a school of thought has grown up that 'an hotel' is correct... blame it all on the educationalists - I would ...

**Drwyd** · 09 January 2012, 10:07 PM

Another quirk --- An ylide is a neutral dipolar molecule

**iamtheblues** · 10 January 2012, 10:47 AM

It basically depends on whether the initial letter of the word is vocalised or not. As Steve rightly points out, hotel is pronounced "otel" by the French, hence the use of an as the indefinite article. There is a detailed discussion about the why and wherefore of this subject here.
Bob.

**AntonyF** · 10 January 2012, 05:12 PM

Originally Posted by Drwyd

What gets me is the misuse of "a" and "an" as in "an HTML file"

Apparently they are called "indefinite articles" or should that be inarticulate infidels ?

Similarly "an historic" drives me insane.

Edit: I see further agreement on this point.

**handrawn** · 10 January 2012, 06:23 PM

I hve just been reading over lunch of 'a FTSE 100' company - pretty sure the word for 'F' begins with a vowel but hey, economists, what do they know... ?

[footsie? - you pronounce it footsie...? youre pulling my leg

.]

**Cloud** · 14 January 2012, 08:39 PM

Not strictly a comment of acronyms but I just heard that the bookstore company Waterstone's (I think they are just based here in the UK) are removing the ' from their logo as they say that it will make it easier for younger people to understand and make it easier to enter in search engines, for texting and for social networking. What a bunch of bloody idiots.