You won't find it in the American Psychiatric Association’s 2013 Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disoders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5), but RAS syndrome is a real thing.
"RAS syndrome (short for "redundant acronym syndrome syndrome") refers to the use of one or more of the words that make up an acronym or initialism in conjunction with the abbreviated form, thus in effect repeating one or more words. Two common examples are "PIN number" (the "N" in PIN stands for "number") and "ATM machine" (the "M" in ATM stands for "machine")." -- accessed September 30, 2015 from Wikipedia
I learned about RAS syndrome from a friend when I laughed about the common access card to which many people refer as the "CAC card" (the "C" in CAC stands for "card"). He responded with another good example: VIN number (the "N" in VIN stands for "number").
This reminds me of my favorite acronym of all time: TADHEA, short for
"The Army Doesn't Have Enough Acronyms."
Have you heard of RAS syndrome? Share your examples in the comments.
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