abbreviation

noun abbreviations · abbr. · abbrv. · abbrev.

1. countable, uncountable The result of shortening or reducing; abridgment.
2. countable, uncountable A shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase used to represent the whole, using omission of letters, and sometimes substitution of letters, or duplication of initial letters to signify plurality, including signs such as +, =, @. Hants is an abbreviation of Hampshire.
3. countable, uncountable The process of abbreviating.
4. countable, uncountable A notation used in music score to denote a direction, as pp or mf.
5. countable, uncountable One or more dashes through the stem of a note, dividing it respectively into quavers, semiquavers, demisemiquavers, or hemidemisemiquavers.
6. countable, uncountable Any convenient short form used as a substitution for an understood or inferred whole. The phrase "civil rights" is an abbreviation for a whole complex of relationships.
7. countable, uncountable Loss during evolution of the final stages of the ancestral ontogenetic pattern.
8. countable, uncountable Reduction to lower terms, as a fraction.

Similar: abbreviature, abridgement, abstract, compend, compression, condensation, contraction, curtailment, epitome, reduction, shortcut, summary · Opposite: amplification, dilation, enlargement, expansion, expatiation, extension, production