Are "i.e." and "e.g." initialisms?

Question

I was told that abbreviations consist of initialisms (FBI, a.k.a.†), acronyms (NATO, ), and shortened words (ad, bike).
† Thanks to Pete Kirkham for correcting me: for most people a.k.a. is an initialism.
But what about i.e. and e.g.? At the first glance, they look as initialisms, but typically we pronounce them as "for example" and "that is", not literally, like "eye ee".
So which subclass of abbreviations they belong to? Initialisms or maybe something different, and why? Are there reputable sources to classify them?

rajah9 · Answer

My trusty Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS), 13th ed. calls e.g. and i.e. "Abbreviations" under the heading of "Scholarship".
Scholarship

14.31 Abbreviations have a very long history of use in the realm of scholarship, and general principles concerning their use are widely agreed upon.

...
General abbreviations such as etc., e.g., and i.e. are preferable confined to parenthetical references.

When pronouncing the first, one could say "eye ee", "id est", or "that is."
When pronouncing the second, one could say "ee gee", "exempli gratia", or "for example."
(This AE speaker prefers the English translation of the Latin, but has heard all three pronounced.)
CMoS calls these abbreviations. I suppose if you had to subclassify them, you might call them scholarly abbreviations.

Are "i.e." and "e.g." initialisms?

One Answer

Scholarship

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