Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Characterized by a narrow, often ostentatious concern for book learning and formal rules: a pedantic attention to details.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a pedant or pedantry; overrating the importance of mere learning; also, making an undue or inappropriate display of learning; of language, style, etc., exhibiting pedantry; absurdly learned: as, a pedantic air.
Wiktionary
- adj. Like a pedant, overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning.
- adj. Being showy of one’s knowledge, often in a boring manner.
- adj. Being finicky or fastidious, especially with language.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Of or pertaining to a pedant; characteristic of, or resembling, a pedant; ostentatious of learning
WordNet 3.0
- adj. marked by a narrow focus on or display of learning especially its trivial aspects
Etymologies
- From pedant + -ic. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“Ha, true, but then we'd have to argue over, since it's not just normal pedantic but * super pedantic*, whether my argument-escape-hatch/weasel words 'pretty close' cover my ass.”
“Egregious typos in pedantic language post = auto-pwn.”
“Not two sentences into their answer the terms pedantic and didactic were employed with professorial authority.”
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“Sorry, I was just being pedantic about the word pedantic, noticing **in general** how people use the term and their topsy-turvy sense of priorities seem to be.”
“Ethan, the danger in being pedantic is that you have to set a good example.”
Speaking of schadenfreude: Meanwhile, in the German elections « BuzzMachine
“It must be confessed, however, that it is generally avoided in print, while the form that we have ventured to call pedantic is not uncommon.”
“The hatred of the pedantic is the characteristic sentiment of the time.”
“There is in a grave disposition, when carried to the point of stiffness and ill-grace toward women, something coarsely pedantic, that is unbecoming in great talents and ridiculous in lesser ones.”
“Not the least among its recommendations is, perhaps, that it is scholarly without being pedantic that is to say, that it aims at correctness without sacrificing the right effect of the whole to over-insistence on small details.”
“These will include essays on contemporary fiction that are indeed a tad too scholarly (some might say "pedantic") or just too long for ordinary blog posts, as well as other surveys or discussionsofcritical books and articles onpost-1980 fiction.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘pedantic’.
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Test Prep or Just for fun
Building a list for standardized test prep or just for learning some new words! Please add any words that you feel are important for the SAT/GRE/GMAT etc...
throng, morass, parley, facile, kismet, strife, jetsam, carrion, annex, harbinger, vestige, surreptitious and 575 more...
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allover
reintegrate, spight, surveillant, harmonize, Colophon, workplace, bigoted, unsighted, bridgework, salutation, voltmeter, octane and 159 more...
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501
Classic
mete, ire, bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado, toil, onus, aberration, abstruse, anomaly and 401 more...
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GRE Barron's 800
abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abject, abjure, abscission, abscond, abstemious, abstinence, abysmal, accretion and 787 more...
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501
Classic
abhor, mirth, obtuse, iota, vex, irk, teem, pith, moot, mete, ire, bane and 401 more...
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501
Classic
irk, teem, blight, pith, moot, mete, ire, bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado and 401 more...
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501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
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P
letters starting with p
predicament, presumptuous, predilection, plausible, preeminent, plaintive, paragon, partisan, pathological, paucity, pedantic, penchant and 28 more...
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People are Scum
words that one may enjoy using to describe other people or their actions
degenerate, reprobate, scapegrace, capricious, sycophant, arbitrary, infernal, abominable, iniquitous, nefarious, philistine, sadistic and 39 more...
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pedantic words
Busie old foole, unruly Sunne,..Sawcy pedantique wretch, goe chide Late schooleboyes.
pedagogic, schoolmasterly, academic, bookish, donnish, dry as dust, dryasdust, pedantic, erudite, formal, inkhorn, learned and 65 more...
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New Words
idiopathic, quidditas, cloacal, peregrination, cyclamen, expatiate, pedantic, salonniere, manque, pelagic, exogenous, pellucid and 83 more...
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gre words
convoluted, deride, melancholy, antagonize, antagonize, deference, portentous, prodigious, ruminate, ineffable, turgid, mossy and 58 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1856 more...
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words to remember
loquacious, decorous, bombastic, impetuous, pedantic, cantankerous, abscond, sagacity, chiaroscuro, histrionic, mincing, maverick
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Smile Words
Just a list of words that make me happy in some little way.
barathum, serendipity, magic, impartial, magnanimous, Agrabah, indefatigable, commonplace, toast, fastidious, pedantic, eccentric
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aykut gre
mossy, intrusive, mettlesome, soliloquy, mocking, dissembler, prevarication, histrionics, aphorism, distinction, concise, pensive and 61 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for pedantic.
kingparton There is nothing so pedantic as pretending not to be pedantic. No man can get above his pursuit in life: it is getting above himself, which is impossible.
William Hazlitt, "On the Conversation of Authors" Nov 15, 2011
milosrdenstvi Don't forget the sour prentices. Aug 24, 2009
bilby "Sawcy pedantique wretch, goe chide Late schooleboyes."
- John Donne, 'Sunne Rising'. Aug 24, 2009
sera "annoyingly proud of learning" Aug 13, 2007
billifer So, John, can I put the antic in pedantic? :-D Jan 5, 2007
kaichi Wordie apparently doesn't hold on to capitalizations. Jan 3, 2007
sonofgroucho Maybe being pedantic is not necessarily a bad thing? Pedantry has just had a bad press in the past. Dec 31, 2006
john Wordie is like the house that pedantry built. It's a machine for with which to be pedantic. It puts the ped in pedantry. Dec 31, 2006
inkhorn Example: "Well, Lois, since you asked, I find this meatloaf rather shallow and pedantic." Dec 13, 2006
tankexmortis Geez, none of you guys capitalized it even! Dec 3, 2006