GS

The Gaza Strip. Come on down, the place is hopping!

GS

The (UK) Geological Society.

.gs

(Domain code for) South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands.

GS

Gradual Student. Sometimes erroneously expanded (next entry).

GS

Graduate Student. A student who has already been graduated and found wanting (more punishment). Thus ``postgraduate student'' in the UK.

GS

Ground Start.

GS, g.s.

Ground State. The lowest-energy eigenstate of a quantum system.

GS

Group Separator. The function originally conceived for the ASCII (and EBCDIC) nonprinting character corresponding to an integer value 0x1D (decimal 29). It is supposed to be equivalent to ^] (control-right-square-bracket), but don't count on it.

GSA

General Services Administration. One of its principal rôles is purchasing department for the US government. Therefore, they are rather important.

Sometimes incorrectly (for the US agency) expanded as ``Government Services Administration.''

GSA

Geological Society of America.

GSA

Georgia Speakers Association. Whut, fer piple huh wanna lerna speak Georgian?

GSA

German Studies Association.

GSA

Girl Scouts of America. Actually, it appears from their website that they are now known as the ``Girl Scouts of the U.S.A.,'' so the letters in the acronym GSA are a less representative sampling of the initials in the name, if not completely inappropriate. They don't explain it, so I suppose they changed it to avoid offending someone. It seems to me that people who worry about giving offense have limited imaginations. If they had adequate imaginations they'd be frozen in terror at the realization that their every action and inaction is offensive to many.

For instance, I'm offended at the stupid programming of the website, including such inanities as that their front page needs a download from the server on every onMouseOver event. Also, the association of girls with cookies or other ``sweets'' is sexist. To counteract this, they should sell beef jerky as well.

Of course, this would not be effective if some enterprising scouts emphasized the cookies and only sold jerky as an ``unadvertised special,'' or if customers bought more cookies than jerky. There is a simple solution to this problem: the girl scouts should only offer beef jerky cookies.

Stammtisch researchers have conducted preliminary taste research using strips of peppered beef jerky sandwiched between peanut butter sandies. Already without any further development, this tastebud-challenging protein treat should be rolled out immediately in the health-food sector. It will sell well to that demographic cherished by marketers, known as the ``early adopters'' or ``suckers.''

Finally, however, the biggest problem is the inclusion in the organization name of girl, a word that is a hated tool of patriarchal oppression. I've given some thought to alternative names, and decided that ``scoutettes,'' ``scoutesses,'' ``female boy scouts'' and ``That's Ms. Scout to you, you got a problem with that?,'' though each has its merits, would in no case be a sufficient improvement to justify the cost of replacing all the old patches. This is going to require a lot more deep thought.

As it happens, the Boy Scouts of America has been accepting girrr--- female memberrrr--- females since about 1970, so chances are they'll be the first to adopt a simplified name like Scouting America. Then scouting will be just like college: coed or all-coed.

Actually, females are only accepted into ``the Explorers,'' which I think has now become ``Venturing.'' When we were peurile, we used to say that we had graduated from Boy Scouting to girl scouting. With names like ``Exploring'' and ``Venturing,'' double entendre is no longer a challenge, so we return you to your regularly scheduled glossary entry.

``Girl Scouts of America'' has twice as many search-engine hits as ``Girl Scouts of the U.S.A.,'' and sampling suggests that many of the latter are just officially dutiful, so I'm leaving GSA, the demotic favorite, as the main entry. The organization is a member of, I'm very sorry about this, WAGGGS.

(Looks like some of my cookie concerns were anticipated. George Carlin wondered during the previous century, ``If peanut butter cookies are made from peanut butter, then what are Girl Scout cookies made out of?'' We actually have a lot of information about cookies in this glossary: a cookies entry, and one for CACO Chocolate Sandwich Cookies.)

GSA

The Graduate Student Association. Vide NAGPS.

GSC

Global Symbology Committee.

G-school

Government(-run) SCHOOL. Some homeschoolers' lingo for public school.

GSD

German Shepherd Dog.

GSDA

Greater San Diego Academy. ``Where Every Moment is a Learning Opportunity for the Homeschool Family.''

GSDB

Genome Sequence DataBase.

GSDF

Ground Self-Defense Force. Official euphemism for the Japanese Army. See SDF.

GSE

Government-Sponsored Enterprise. Such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

GSE

Ground State Energy. The energy of the ground state of a quantum mechanical system. A tiny bit more information is at the ZPE entry.

GSEU

Graduate Student Employees Union.

GSFC

Goddard Space Flight Center. In Greenbelt, MD.

GSFLT

Graduate Student Foreign Language Test.

GSG

Global Strategy Group. A public-opinion polling organization that works for Democratic clients. It's listed here in a list of polling organizaitions I threw together during an episode of political news addiction (the US elections in 2000).

GSGG

Gadolinium Scandium Gallium Garnet. Laser material.

GSI

General Standard Israeli. I.e., Modern Hebrew.

GSI

Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung. German, `Society For Heavy-Ion Research.' I don't know exactly why it has a name like this, but GSI refers to Germany's national center for heavy ion physics, a large-scale research facility in Darmstadt.

GSL

``The Geological Society of London (GSL) was founded in 1807. It is the oldest national geological society in the world and the largest in Europe. It was incorporated under Royal Charter in 1825 and is Registered Charity 210161.''

Sometimes I get tired of making stuff up and feel like quoting instead. This quote is from the copyright page of the book cited at the ichnology entry.

GSM

Global System for Mobile [tele]communications. English-language expansion eventually adopted for commercialization. Acronym originally stood for Groupe Spéciale Mobile, created in 1982 by the CEPT to develop a pan-European public land mobile system. [In 1989 it became a special subgroup in the ETSI).] Two major implementations are DCS-1800 and PCS-1900.

This will point you to some information.

GSMBE

Gas-Source MBE.

GSN

Grocery Shopping Network. Food shopping from the convenience of your ergonomic chair.

GSNA

Goethe Society of North America.

GSO

Gd₂SiO₅.

GSO

GeoSynchronous Orbit. Earth orbit with an orbital period of one day.

GSO

Grassroots Support Organization. The translation of ``grass roots'' into Spanish, raízes de pasto, does not preserve its metaphorical sense. The acronym corresponding to GSO in Spanish is OAB.

GSOH, G.S.O.H.

Good Sense Of Humour. Chiefly British. Also: Good Sense Of Humor.

The British playwright Nick Wood wrote a one-act entitled ``Female 29, G.S.O.H.'' Dramatis Personae: Tom, 30, and Kate, 32. (Cf. recent photograph.)

GSOTD

Geek Site Of The Day.

GSP

Generalized System of Preference. A system approved by GATT in 1971 that authorizes developed countries to give preferential tariff treatment to developing countries (DC's). This tariff regime was nonreciprocal, although if it had been perfectly reciprocal it wouldn't have made much of a difference: the DC's tend to have primary-sector exports, with trade in particular commodities all one way or the other.

GSP

Global Service Provider.

G-spot

(Dr. Ernest) Grafenberg spot. An especially sensitive part of the vagina, on the anterior wall a few cm behind the pubic bone, first identified by Dr. and Mrs. G, or so we are given to understand. Controversy: is this completely bogus? For noncommital answers and forthright evasions and to get your jollies just talking to a machine about it, follow the instructions at the TIPS entry.

GSPW

Garden State ParkWay. Exits are labeled according to their distance from the southern end of the parkway at Cape May, and it is widely believed that NJ residents identify their home by exit number. This is a good story. More at NJTP.

GSR

Galvanic Skin Response. Sweating increases the electrical conductivity of the skin. (Sweat is an electrolyte. Visit the Pocari Sweat entry, just for the enlightenment.)

GSS

Gerstmann-Straussler-Scheinker syndrome. A disease of humans, suspected of being caused or transmitted by prions, q.v.

GSS

Gruppo di Studio della Scoliosi e delle patologie vertebrali. Italian `Group for the Study of Scoliosis and vertebral pathologies.' It doesn't translate very elegantly, and the English pages of the website don't offer a translation. The original short name can be rendered accurately as `Scoliosis Study Group.' Founded in 1978.

GSSP

Global Stratotype Section and Point. Defines a geological stratum somewhat as a species type defines a species, I think.

GST

Goods and Services Tax. A Canadian excise tax on just about everything, which accounted for tour buses that came directly to Buffalo-area shopping malls. They still come, but not so much at current exchange rates. (This entry was written around 1995 or 1996, so you might want to call ahead.)

GSTM

GreTai Securities Market. Official name of the Taiwan OTC Exchange.

GSUSA

Girl Scouts of the USA. See the GSA entry. Hmmm -- what am I going to do with this entry now that I've got it? Okay, the Canadian sister organization, Girl Guides of Canada -- Guides du Canada, doesn't seem to use an acronym, so this is as good a place as any from which to link to it.

GSW

GunShot Wound.

GT

Gate-Triggered.

GT

Gran Tour / Grand Tour / Gran Turismo. Désignation sans signification / Meaningless designation / Indicazione insignificante on many cars. The 1964 Studebaker Hawk actually had the meaningless designation spelled out in chrome letters along the passenger side of the car (Italian version).

GT

Gross Ton.

GT

Grupo de Tareas. Spanish for `Task Force (TF).'

.gt

(Domain name code for) Guatemala.

GTA

Graduate Teaching Assistant. The usual kind of TA.

An interesting GTA experience was reported on the classics list.

GTA

Grand Theft Auto. A video game. See this bit for an excuse to play.

GTA

Gravure Technical Association. Merged with the GRI to form the GAA in 1987.

GTA

Greater Toronto Area. If you exclude Toronto itself, the GTA is somewhat of a moving target. Atlanta used to be like that.

I've seen the expression regional Ontario used by statisticians to refer to Ontario minus the GTA and the National Capital Region (the Ottawa area).

GTAW

Gas Tungsten Arc Welding. Distinguished from ordinary gas-metal-arc welding by the fact that the refractory metal tungsten (W) is not consumed in the welding process. (Actually, the nonconsumable electrode is not usually pure tungsten, but an alloy that is about 98% tungsten. Quibbles.) See GMA welding entry for further description. GTAW is also called TIG welding (tungsten inert-gas) or WIG.

GTBC

Great Texas Birding Classic. An event held on the coast at Corpus Christi in late April every year since 1995. I've seen claims that it's the longest-running competitive birding tournament. It might be the only one.

GTBOA

Glad To Be Of Assistance.

GTBOS

Glad To Be Of Service.

GTC

General Teaching Council for England. See GTCE.

GTC, g.t.c.

Good Till { Cancelled | Countermanded }. I thought I already mentioned here somewhere the opening scene of the movie Twelve Chairs. Remember?

GTC-CVD

Gas-Temperature-Controlled Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD, q.v.).

GTCE

General Teaching Council for England. ``[T]he professional body for teachers.'' Internal literature tends to call it ``GTC'' or ``GTC for England.'' Cf. NUT.

GTD

Geometrical Theory of Diffraction.

GTD

Getting Things Done. A reference to Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity (2001), by management consultant David Allen.

GTE

General Telephone and Electric.

G-T effect

Gibbs-Thompson Effect. Nucleation that starts in freezing of a microscopic volume with a curved surface occurs at a temperature that depends on the curvature. Smaller (higher-curvature) microdroplets have a lower freezing temperature. Similar phenomena in other phase transitions are also called G-T effect. (E.g., supersaturation of a solute; similar description with ``microdroplets'' --> ``microcrystals,'' mutatis mutandis). This is also described as a ``higher solubility'' of small droplets.)

GTEL

Gas Turbine-Electric Locomotive. A locomotive in which a gas turbine is used to generate electric power that feeds electric motors that actually perform the locomotion.

GTF

Glucose Tolerance Factor.

In the 1950's, Klaus Schwartz and Walter Mertz were doing some experiments on selenium (Se) in rat diets. For protein, their rats were getting Torula yeast supplements, and they found that their rats had high blood sugar (glucose). This is called glucose intolerance (i.e., the muscle and fat cells that would absorb glucose don't, as much), and suggested inefficient insulin activity.

Following up on some earlier indications that brewer's yeast improves the efficiency of insulin (see insulin), they switched their rats to brewer's yeast and solved the glucose intolerance problem. They coined the term GTF to designate the as-yet unknown agent, present in brewer's yeast but absent in Torula yeast, that improved insulin efficiency. They later found that pork liver extract was also effective. They found that chromium (Cr) was present in brewer's yeast and pork liver extract, and absent from Torula yeast, so they guessed that GTF included chromium.

Multiple studies have since demonstrated that chromium ion alone is not effective, and have suggested that the chromium (III) ion is effective when it is chelated with picolinate proteins. Many researchers believe that chromium picolinate is in fact GTF, and that possibly it works by deforming or reshaping insulin so that it couples more precisely to the insulin receptors on cell membranes. Although there is circumstantial evidence for this, there is no direct biochemical evidence of combined insulin/chromium-picolinate action at the cell membrane.

GTFO

Get Out. Emphatic.

GTG

Game-Tying Goals. (Soccer statistic.)

GTG

Gesellschaft für Technikgeschichte. German `Society for the History of Technology.'

GTGN

Got to go now.

GThom

The Gospel of THOMas. This work was mentioned in the fourth century by Origen, along with a Gospel of Matthias and unnamed others, as necessary reading for someone not to be considered ignorant, in addition to the canonical four gospels exclusively recognized and approved by the Church of Rome.

This noncanonical text (GThom) was largely lost for centuries, until 1945, when it was rediscovered among over fifty texts at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. There they had been hidden in the late fourth century, buried in a jar. These messages in a bottle, this time capsule, protected them from a crusading church that had been hunting down heresy since it gained ascendancy in the early part of that century. Considering how long that continued, they were rediscovered almost too soon.

GThomas is closer to the three synoptics than GJohn is, and played a large role in the silly deliberations of the Jesus Seminar (see TFG).

G-TiN

Gold TiN. TiN with relatively high density, obtained by sputter deposition under significant bias (-75V in work reported by N. Kumar, J. T. McGinn, K. Pourrezaei, B. Lee, and E. C. Douglas, Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology A, vol. 6, p. 1602 (1988).

See TiN entry.

GTK

Get[ting] To Know. As in ``GTK party.''

GTL

Gunning Transceiver Logic. This page from TI.

gTLD

Generic Top-Level (Internet) Domain.

GTO

Name of a Pontiac muscle car popular in the 1960's. Maybe the name stands for ``Gran Turismo Omologato.'' Maybe not. The Beach Boys recorded a popular song celebrating it. Song is in the time signature of five speeds.

Also a designation on racing Ferraris, but that probably has nothing to do.

GTO

Gate-Triggered Oscillator. Here's almost a tutorial from Westcode.

GTO

Gate Turn-Off. As in ``GTO thyristor.'' Two flavors: anode short (SG) and reverse-conducting (SGR).

GTO

Gaussian-Type Orbitals. Basis states (for chemical calculations) which decay as Gaussians with radius from an atomic center, unlike hydrogen-atom levels. Their advantage over more-accurate Slater-type orbitals (STO) is speed of computation.

GTO

Geostationary Transfer Orbit.

GTO

Gran Turismo Omologato. Italian, `Grand Tour Homologous.'

GTO

Graph-To-Occam. An experimental language for representing dataflow diagrams. The compiler translates GTO programs into Occam2 for execution on a transputer system.

GTP

Guanosine 5'-TriPhosphate. Functions like ATP, in a pair with GDP like ATP/ADP, but involved in a more limited set of processes having to do with the construction of cellular structures.

GTP BP

Guanosine TriPhosphate (GTP) Binding Protein (BP).

GTS

Gifted {and|or} Talented Student[s]. Why have I never heard this abbreviated ``gee-tee stud''?

GTS

Gilles de la Tourette Syndrome. Studied (as a ``convulsive tic syndrome'') by Georges Gilles de la Tourette and named for him by his mentor Jean-Martin Charcot. GTS is now understood to be an autosomal dominant trait (and sexually influenced -- of those with the abnormal gene, virtually all males and only about 70% of females exhibit the trait). It is most frequently found among Ashkenazi Jews. Its most notorious symptom is coprolalia (trash-mouth), but that occurs in a small minority of sufferers (8% in one study). In addition the extensive OMIM article linked above, see Jumping Frenchmen of Maine Syndrome

GTS

Global Telecommunications System.

GTXC

Global Telephone eXchange Carrier.

GU

Genito-Urinary (system).

GU

Geographically Undesirable.

Sure. A dating cop-out. A nice brush-off. Cf. ASL.

GU

Griffith University, somewhere down under.

.gu

(Domain code for) Guam.

GU

Guam. USPS abbreviation.

The Villanova Center for Information Law and Policy serves a page of Guam territorial government links.

Guarantee degrees from Prestigious non-accredited Universitys

• There are no required tests, classes, books, or interviews!
• Get a Bachelors, Masters, MBA, GED and Doctorate (PhD) diploma!
• Receive the benefits and admiration that comes with a diploma!
• Available international!
• And best of all, No one is turned down!

GUI

Graphical User Interface. [Pron. ``gooey.''] Cf. CLI, WYSIWYG.

This here page is my favorite page about a ``GUI Interface'' (a/k/a acronym-AAP).

Guicciardini

Francesco Guicciardini, a diplomat and public official for Florence and for the Vatican in the early sixteenth century, left behind collections of Ricordi. Ricordo might be best translated, in this instance, as `thing to remember.' The typical ricordo consists of a general maxim accompanied by a paragraph, or rarely two, of explanation and analysis. Over the course of his career, as time was available, he polished, reconsidered, reorganized, and added to the hoard, which was intended as a sort of legacy to his descendants. (He published some books as well, but the Ricordi were preserved only in the family archives.) The largest and last autograph manuscript contains 221 ricordi that are called series C.

When I quote Guicciardini in Domandi's version, I refer to Maxims and Reflections (Ricordi) (New York: Harper and Rowe Publishers, 1965) [Translation and Preface copyright Mario Domandi, Introduction copyright Nicolai Rubinstein]. It was republished as Pennsylvania Paperback 37 by the University of Pennsylvania Press in 1972.

GUID

Global Unique IDentifier.

guillemet

A quotation mark that looks like a pair of short angle brackets in parallel orientation: («) or (»). Guillemets are the regular form of quotation mark in French and Russian, and are occasionally used in other languages such as English and German. The name of the symbols is the diminutive of the French name Guillaume (`William'), their supposed inventor.

In German, they may be used in what looks like an interchanged form: »quoted text«. The only reason I can think of for this is that the shape of » (``concave left,'' as my high school math teachers might have described it) resembles that of the low-9 double-quote („) that traditionally begins a German quotation („usual German style“). [And conversely on the opposite end, of course.

guinea

An old British gold coin worth twenty-one shillings -- so charmingly odd, traditional British eccentricity -- 252 (old) pence. One guinea was the retainer John Adams received to defend the British soldiers accused in the Boston massacre. (He won his case, pretty much, on testimony that the soldiers were attacked by a large crowd bent on murder and fired in self-defense. Later, Adams became the second president of the US. See the dynasty entry.)

guitar

Here are links with guitaristic information. Better follow them now, because soon I'll find some totally irresponsible and inappropriate places to hide them in the glossary, and you'll never seem them again.

• AGS.
• AIG.
• Air guitar.
• Alembic
• ASTA.
• Bibliography, courtesy of Kenneth Sparr.
• Bo Diddley.
• Cent.
• CG.
• Cocobolo.
• Day Tripper.
• EADGBE.
• EBGDBE.
• ESP.
• Dobro.
• Eddie Ate Dynamite.
• Frass (fret etymology is discussed after frass entomology).
• Fret.
• GFA.
• The Guitar Academy.
• IGRA.
• JcG.
• Guitarras José Ramírez. Luthiers serving Madrid and the surrounding area (within two earth radii).
• Leadbelly.
• Led Zeppelin.
• Mendoza's Guitars. Known throughout the greater Roseland, Indiana, micropolitan area.
• Monkees guitar vulgaroso travesty bitterly recalled in a tangent off the entry for As Time Goes By.
• N.C.
• Silent guitar (or skip the middleman and go directly to backboard).
• Discussion of musical instrument (electric guitar) amplifiers in the tube entry.
• Twelve-string.
• UB40 (guitar amp and rock group).

guitar nebula

This looks like a glossary entry for guitar nebulae, but it's just a bit of prepositioned dross, filler material, so that when I find out what a guitar nebula is, as I promised in the DBAli entry, I can slip the information in quickly. Also, this way no other entry will steal this space. It's reserved, like a Stammtisch.

For now, I think I can say with some confidence that a guitar nebula is a nebula that in some way (like maybe the shape) resembles a guitar.

GULAG

Glavnoe Upravlenie ispravitel'-no-trudovykh LAGerei. Russian, `chief administration of corrective labor camps.'

Gulliver's Travels

A travelogue by Jonathan Swift. The man was a real jinx. If you wanted to collect on your insurance with Lloyd's, or get rid of a captain, sign Gulliver on as ship's physician.

gunner

One of the players on the team punting or kicking off who runs down inside the sidelines to hem in and intercept the kick-returner.

Gunni

You're obviously thinking of Dr. Gunni.

gupta

Hindi for `secret.' Nihar was so impressed by the fact that I knew of Oriya, that afterwards when we were speculating on the etymology of Ashish's family name and he translated gupta, Nihar opined that I would remember that translation for ten years.

I pondered this remark in detail. I allowed myself to wonder whether Nihar thought that until February 2007, if someone leaned toward me and whispered conspiratorially ``I've got a gupta,'' I would `get it,' but that after that time I would just push the guy away and say ``American social distance is 24 inches plus-or-minus four; please respect my physical space, especially if agupta is a communicable disease.'' This scenario didn't seem realistic, except for the American-social-distance part, so I concluded that Nihar didn't mean ten years exactly. Instead, he was using `ten years' to mean `long time.' Could this be regarded as a kind of synecdoche? Not really, but I figured I'd put in a plug for my poetry. Nihar is young, so he thinks that ten years can be regarded as a ``long time.'' My friends Dennis and Jamie have two toddlers now, and I haven't seen them since the wedding (seen the parents!). I hope to visit them before the kids go off to college.

(Yes, it's the same Dennis as the one who takes a glossary bow at the RLC entry.)

The common family name Gupta, incidentally, seems to have a different etymology. Now here is an irony: Adly was trying all during this conversation to derive large chunks of the Hindi vocabulary from Arabic, but he didn't claim gupta. As it happens, the ancient religious name for Memphis (the one in Egypt, not the enduring Elvis-worship center in Tennessee) was Ha ka  ptah. In the seventh century, the conquering Arabs corrupted this to Agupta, and eventually the initial a was elided as well. The g was devoiced again on entering English and some other European languages, becoming our Copt[ic].

GURPS

Generic Universal RolePlaying System. GURPS is intended for every RPG genre, and the distributor, Steve Jackson Games, announces that ``[o]ver 250 different worldbooks, sourcebooks and adventure books have been created for GURPS. About 100 of these are currently in print, and we create at least a half-dozen more every year.''

Cf. FUDGE.

GUT

Grand Unified Theory. A unified description of all (four) interactions (gravitational, electromagnetic, nuclear-weak, nuclear-strong).

guy

Following the pattern of languages with more thoroughly gendered nouns, English construes the singular form as male but leaves the plural form sex non-specific. Unless you want to make a federal case about it.

GUY

Guyana. ISO's TLA.

GVMA

Georgia Veterinary Medical Association. See also AVMA.

GVP

Gas-Vesicle Protein.

GVSU

Grand Valley State University at Allendale, Michigan.

GVW

Gross Vehicle Weight.

GVWR

Gross Vehicle Weight Rating. The maximum gross (vehicle plus cargo) weight that can be carried by a vehicle (we're talkin' truck here).

Gross weight is easy to measure without unloading the truck.

A vehicle's GVWR obviously cannot be greater than the sum of its axles' GAWR's. It may be less, however: If the total GAWR is reached by placing all the load halfway between tho distant axles, the frame may buckle.

For more, see the NTEA's glossary of Truck Equipment Terms.

GW

George Washington.

GW

Gross Weight.

.gw

(Domain name code for) Guinea-Bissau.

GWA

Garden Writers Association. As of 2007, according to the homepage, it's ``an organization of over 1800 professional communicators in the lawn and garden industry. No other organization in the industry has as much direct contact with the buying public as GWA.'' By the time I clicked on the link for GWAF. As recently as when its membership was at 1500 (a couple of hours ago?), it was called the GWAA.

GWAA

Garden Writers Association of America. Why plant? New full-texture printers produce bright green professional-landscaper-quality turf at less than half the cost of traditional methods. Perfect for a drought!

The GWAA was founded in 1948 and mowed off its own final A (ouch!) before fall 2007. It's now the GWA.

GWAF

Garden Writers Association Foundation. A charity launched in 2002 to administer and expand the Plant a Row for the Hungry (PAR) program that had been initiated in 1995 by the GWA (or maybe then the GWAA).

GW-BASIC

Gee-Whiz BASIC.

GWC

Geoctroyeerde West-Indische Compagnie. The Dutch `Chartered West Indies Company' of old. It's more commonly referred to as the WIC. Octrooieren is the modern spelling of a word meaning `to patent, charter.' The past participle (appropriately inflected as an adjective here) is spelled geoctrooieerde.

It may not look it, but octrooieren (and German oktroyieren) are cognate with the English authorize. The former words were borrowed from the French (octroyer, Old French octroier, medieval Latin auctorizare). The Latin roots lie in auctor, an agent from augere, `to make grow, originate, increase.' In Spanish, at least, aumentar is `to increase.' The cognate English augment means the same thing in general, but everyone recognizes that it is not exactly the same thing. The word augment emphasizes the secondary nature of the increase, or the fact that the increase is the result of external addition rather than organic or internal growth. The sense of auctorizare taken by octroier was `to grant,' which is not too big a jump from `increase.' One archaic sense of French augmenter is `to extend [s.o.'s lands],' something that might often be the result of a grant. The English word author is also derived from auctorizare, but via a different French word derived from it: autoriser (still generally auctoriser in the 14th c.).

Another Latin noun was actor, derived from agere (`to do, act, drive') as auctor was from augere. The words auctor and actor were already confused in medieval Latin, and the similarity of the words and their derivatives continued to have effects in English as well as in various (probably most) Romance languages.

GWDG

Gesellschaft für wissenschaftliche Datenverarbeitung mbH Göttingen. German: `Goettingen Society for Scientific Torturing of Data.' This might also be translated `... Processing of Data,' but what fun would that be?

GWG

Game-Winning Goals. (Soccer statistic.)

GWG

Gesellschaft für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, e.V. The homepage offers the alternative names ``Société d'Histoire des Sciences - Society for History of Science.''

GWN

Great White North. Currently an ironic reference to Canada. The phrase was popularized in the early 1980's as the name of an SCTV parody featuring the stupid stereotypes Bob and Doug McKenzie.

The earliest instance I can find of this phrase, without looking too hard, is as the title of a book about Arctic exploration by Helen S. Wright (Macmillans, October 1910). It's not specifically about Canada; however, the first notice of it in the New York Times appears in an article that also mentions a novel of life in western Canada, Janey Canuck in the West (Cassells, October 1910).

In 1916, Harry Bowling's poem ``Mexico'' was published in the Los Angeles Times. There, the ``great white north'' appears to refer to the US. (The poem makes references to race, so that is how ``white'' may be understood.) The LA Times is also the source of most of the movie information in the next few paragraphs.

In 1928, H.A. and Sidney Snow made a documentary about the 1913 expedition to the Arctic to rescue the lost Steffansson Expedition. (Vilhjalmur Stefansson, born in 1879 in Manitoba, provides a short prologue.) It was originally released by Fox in August as ``Lost in the Arctic.'' Later that fall, Fox was assembling a cast for a project called ``The Great White North,'' to be directed by Charles Klein. Over the course of a week, the studio leaked out bits of information -- that Nancy Carroll would play the lead and that Fox would ``likely ... go on location to Canada for exteriors'' (October 27); that John Boles would play the male lead (``Peter Van Dykeman'') opposite Carroll's ``Pearl'' (October 30); that Josephine Dunn was to play the third featured lead (``Ethelyn'') and that the title had been changed to ``White Silence'' (Nov. 3; I think that's the title: the photoreproduction is creased along the line that gives it). The following February, Fox-Movietone rereleased the Snow movie -- I mean the movie by the Snows. (``Lost in the Arctic,'' remember? Pay attention or you'll get lost.) They used the title ``The Great White North,'' which was of course made available by the name change in the Nancy Carroll vehicle. According to IMDb, the title ``Stella Polaris'' was also used for the Snow movie.

Now ``White Silence,'' the second announced title for the original ``Great White North'' movie, happens also to be the title of a Jack London short story. It seems to be a title that studios later think better (i.e., worse) of. For example, on May 20, 1923, it had been reported that the Alaska Moving-Pictures Corporation had changed the name of its current project, filming in Anchorage, from ``The Great White Silence'' to ``The Cheechakos.'' That was also the spelling on July 29, but it was eventually released as ``The Chechahcos'' (1924). It's a classic. By 1929, as the Fox studio name modification indicates, Hollywood was in the midst of the talkie revolution, and ``silence'' was a dirty word. So as you'd expect, the name was changed again, this time to ``Sin Sister.''

Speaking of dirty words, an article published on September 29, 1929, ``Censors Worry Talkie Makers,'' reported that Fox was puzzled by the censors' demand that they cut a segment showing a man perfuming himself in reel 6 of ``Sin Sister.'' According to a Washington Post article at the time of the March 1929 release, it's described as ``a gripping drama of the frozen North which deals with six ill-assorted companions who are marooned in a deserted trading post, and their reaction to terrible conditions of hardship.'' Nancy Carroll, in the title role, is ``a poor, untutored, small-time vaudeville dancer.'' Lawrence Gray (who replaced Boles) is ``scion of an aristocratic old family.'' They emerge from all the adversity as ``a real woman and a real man.'' Excuse me while I wipe my eyes.

In 1935, the Clarke Steamship Co., Ltd., based in New York, was running ``Great White North Cruises,'' 10½ to 13½ days, to the ``Land of the Eskimos.''

GWOT

Global War On Terror.

GWP

Gross World Product. Can be computed as the sum of either GDP or GNP, and it should come out the same.

GWR

The Great Western Railway. Also expanded by Great Western enthusiasts as ``God's Wonderful Railway.'' For the other mainline railway companies of Britain's Grouping era, see Big Four.

GWS

Girls and Women in Sport. See NAGWS.

GWS

Ground Water Supply.

GWSS

Ground Water Supply Survey.

GWTW

``Gone With The Wind.'' Don't you know anything? A popular novel and blockbuster movie.

GWU

George Washington University. Located in the District of Columbia. Named after a US president. The school teams' nickname is ``Colonials.'' I find this faintly ironic.

Go to this page to learn about ``NCAA regulations relating to a Division I Collegiate Institution.''

GWU

Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht. A German journal that might have been named `History in Scholarship and Instruction' in English. Maybe. Wissenschaft could mean a lot of things, and I never read the journal. See if Stuart Jenks's page of Tables of Contents of Historical Journals and Monographic Series in German has a link for this yet (deutsche Seite: Zeitschriftenfreihandmagazin Inhaltsverzeichnisse geschichtswissenschaftlicher Zeitschriften in deutscher Sprache).

GX

Global eXchange. For related (similar and dissimilar) organizations, see the WTO entry.

GXL

Gas-eXpanded Liquid.

Gy

GraY. The gray is the SI unit of absorbed radiation dose, defined as one joule per kilogram. ``Radiation dose'' refers to ``ionizing radiation'' (gamma rays and X-rays, and also high-energy alpha and beta rays, etc.). Ordinary radiant heat doesn't count.

.gy

(Domain name code for) Guyana. Makes me think of Lo-lo-lo-lo-lola.

gym

Self-serve dungeon. See gymnasium.

gymnasium

In English, a gymnasium is an open indoor space or a building in which physical sports are played and exercises performed. In German, this is called a Turnhalle (but gymnastics is Gymnastik).

In German, Gymnasium is what is called a `secondary school' in the Anglophone parts of North America (and escuela secundaria in Hispanophone America). In the UK, that used to be called grammar school, q.v.

In the US, grammar school is synonymous with primary school. The correspondences are all approximate: primary education extends to about age 11-12, varying slightly among and within countries. There was a time when the word infant in the UK referred to older kids than it does in the US now, and the early years of primary school were for ``infants.'' I'm too lazy to check what the current situation is. One advantage of this terminology is that the teachers can claim that every schoolday they face the infantry.

Also in English, the short form gym refers to a space filled with instruments of self-torture; it's usually air-conditioned and well-lit, but otherwise it's a dungeon. Also, in schools, ``gym'' (an uncountable noun) or ``gym class'' is held in ``the gym'' or ``the gymnasium'' (or outside). Corrections please! I'm trying to get this sorted out myself. Write to me and I will creatively misinterpret your comments.

The word gymnasium is the Latin adaptation of the Greek word gymnásion (a place to train), from gymnázein `to train, to exercise, to feel pain' (okay, really only the first two, but obviously the third is implied), from gymnós, `naked.'

gypsum

Hydrated calcium sulfate.

G-10

Green fiberglass used for many PC boards.

G-24

The ``Group of Twenty-Four.'' The 24 countries -- eight each from Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia -- which coordinate the positions of developing nations on monetary and finance issues and to ensure that those positions are adequately represented to the IMF and World Bank.

G6PD

Glucose-6-Phosphate Dehydrogenase. An enzyme whose deficiency is a risk factor for hemolytic crisis. The deficiency is an inherited trait.

G-7

The ``Group of Seven'' leading industrialized nations (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, US). Evidently, mere size of economy has not been quite the only criterion for membership. It's more like disposable income that matters. FWIW, Brazil and a couple of other non-leading-industrialized nations have economies larger than Canada's. We'll pass over in silence the matter of China. Since 1975, the seven have held a major photo opportunity annually, featuring one head of state or government from each country. For a while there was talk of a G-8. Gorby and then Yeltsin would come around to the party, insisting on being treated as equals. It was embarrassing to watch, but apparently every litter has to have a runt.

Back around 1990, there was a big to-do because Italy's official economy had come to exceed that of the UK. In fact, with estimates of the underground economy running in the ballpark of 20% of the legal one, Italy's GDP may already have overtaken France's.

A standard locution of journalistspeak is ``France and Germany, the two largest economies in Europe.'' Yeah, well.

G-77

The Group of Seventy-Seven. I've seen this described as a ``group of developing countries and China.'' I guess this means that China is acting as some sort of disinterested uncle.

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