Timeline for What are the origins of "tech" as an abbreviation for "technology?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
9 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| May 11, 2022 at 2:45 | comment | added | A.K. Stopper | No, "tech" is definitely an abbreviation for "technology" in some contexts, and that's the sense in which I'm interested in the etymology. Interestingly, some of its earliest appearances in Google date-restricted searches are in old Scientology newsletters. | |
| May 10, 2022 at 22:19 | comment | added | Phil Sweet | It's not short for anything. Here it is a collective noun like kit or luggage. It's less conceptual than technology. The stuff depicted in the cartoons is tech - like this box of tech. That's why I chose to post that particular example - because of that usage. | |
| May 10, 2022 at 13:05 | comment | added | A.K. Stopper | Yes, I'm really looking for the origins of "tech" asn an abbreviation for "technology;" that likely wasn't very clear in my original post. | |
| May 10, 2022 at 4:27 | comment | added | Peter | In this cartoon "tech" would be short for "technician" rather than "technology". | |
| May 10, 2022 at 2:30 | comment | added | Xanne | Why would this be closed, except for some rigidity about doing research? It was asked only 5 hours ago. | |
| May 10, 2022 at 2:28 | comment | added | Xanne | See also en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramblin'_Wreck_from_Georgia_Tech The song forst appeared in print in 1908. | |
| May 10, 2022 at 1:10 | comment | added | A.K. Stopper | collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/tech | |
| May 10, 2022 at 1:08 | comment | added | A.K. Stopper | Thanks Phil and Stuart. Phil - I've consulted Tom Chatfield's book "Netymology," which traces the origins of many tech-related terms, but doesn't include "tech" specifically. I can see from this Collins graph that the word "tech" started to rise in popularity in the early to mid-1980s. Thanks for the cartoon - it's interesting to see the word in that context as early as the 60s. I've also consulted some articles in the NYTs and New Yorker by Steve Lohr and Ben Yagoda, but they focused on tracing words like "hacker" and "Big Data." I'm specifically interested in why/how "tech" began to rise. | |
| May 9, 2022 at 22:07 | history | answered | Phil Sweet | CC BY-SA 4.0 |