University abbrev. (and article usage with names)

[emckean at ENTERACT.COM]

I know I've said "The U. of C." pronounced as (forgive the sloppy system)
"thuh yoo-uh see."

If you say this fast enough, to someone from Chicago, they answer brightly
"Oh? Circle?" (UIC, University of Illinois Chicago, which used to be
called Circle campus. Many a fine linguist there in those days.)

--Erin McKean
editor at verbatimmag.com

>
> The Ohio State University is officially so-called (with the article),
> but I'm pretty sure it's only ever abbreviated as OSU (I go to (*the)
> OSU). Then there are all those abbreviations, which we probably had a
> thread on a while back, of the form "UX" vs. "U. of X." vs. "the U. of
> X.", for various values of X.
>
> Larry
>
> >As I recall, a well-known university in your home state is officially
> >named "THE Johns Hopkins University," and I'm a little less sure, but I
> >THINK Penn State's official name is "THE Pennsylvania State
> University." >Colloquial usage, of course, would tend to leave off the
> article >(unless local usage in those places has this same quirk),
> making these >actually examples of the opposite of the BYU usage you
> describe. >
> >Peter Mc. >
> >On Thu, 28 Oct 1999 09:13:07 -0600 David Bowie
> <db.list at PMPKN.NET> >wrote:
> > >
> >> And now for the oddity in article usage: When i first came here, one
> of >> the things i noticed was that several local speakers use the
> definite >> article when naming BYU, as in "So you want to drive to
> *the* Brigham >> Young University?" or "Here's how to get to *the*
> BYU". This seems odd >> to my Southern Maryland born-and-bred self--i
> can't put an article, >> definite or not, before the name of a school
> ending with "university" >> or "college" (as opposed to a school name
> beginning with those words, >> where i can freely include the definite
> article, and it would in fact >> usually be required). Has anyone
> anywhere noticed similar constructions >> with school names *ending* in
> those words? >
> >---------------------- >Peter A. McGraw
> >Linfield College >McMinnville, Oregon
> >pmcgraw at linfield.edu
> --- End Forwarded Message ---
>
>
> ----------------------
> Peter A. McGraw
> Linfield College
> McMinnville, Oregon
> pmcgraw at linfield.edu
>