Hmm, I was wondering why I keep seeing NDN crop up for Native Americans.
Try pronouncing the letters out loud and see what they sound like, and all should be made clear. ;)
It's slang of the sort that works primarily on the textual level, since it obviously sounds the same as one of the usual terms when spoken out loud; so you'll see it used a fair bit online as something of an in-group marker, with the happy side effect for folks who recognize it of somewhat averting the confusion that can be caused due to the namespace collision with people-from-India. Usage is probably heavier among younger wired folks, as it follows formation patterns similar to 133tspeak, IM/texting shorthand, and lots of other forms of online slang; note also the parallel to the use of "AZN" for Asian. I don't know just how far back its usage goes but in my experience it really started exploding in native web boards, mailing lists and Usenet groups like alt.native and soc.culture.native in the late 1990s.
- with regards from another one of those educated, articulate, SF-reading, computer-usin' NDNs whose mere existence seem to make LMB's poor boggled head explodiate. And a raving Saiyuki fangirl to boot, so much love for the Goku icon, BTW! ^_^
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Try pronouncing the letters out loud and see what they sound like, and all should be made clear. ;)
It's slang of the sort that works primarily on the textual level, since it obviously sounds the same as one of the usual terms when spoken out loud; so you'll see it used a fair bit online as something of an in-group marker, with the happy side effect for folks who recognize it of somewhat averting the confusion that can be caused due to the namespace collision with people-from-India. Usage is probably heavier among younger wired folks, as it follows formation patterns similar to 133tspeak, IM/texting shorthand, and lots of other forms of online slang; note also the parallel to the use of "AZN" for Asian. I don't know just how far back its usage goes but in my experience it really started exploding in native web boards, mailing lists and Usenet groups like alt.native and soc.culture.native in the late 1990s.
- with regards from another one of those educated, articulate, SF-reading, computer-usin' NDNs whose mere existence seem to make LMB's poor boggled head explodiate. And a raving Saiyuki fangirl to boot, so much love for the Goku icon, BTW! ^_^