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 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
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.”
Build Blog » A Vocabulary List for Architects Who Want to Get Things Built
“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’.
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
-
Words related to knowledge
Words that relate to learning, knowing, being enlightened...
revelation, eureka, awakening, idea, sapient, astute, canny, intelligent, wise, sharp, shrewd, informed and 466 more...
-
Words build meanings from origins( etymology )
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 837 more...
-
Antics
anticonvulsant, pedantic, unanticipated, atlantic, semantics, canticle, geanticline, manticore, anticyclone, antichrist, infanticide, antic and 44 more...
-
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 30 more...
-
For Summer
analogous, prestidigitation, defenestrate, crux, supercilious, sunglasses, replete, foment, anthropomorphic, iota, intrinsic, prosaic and 29 more...
-
words to remember
loquacious, decorous, bombastic, impetuous, pedantic, cantankerous, abscond, sagacity, chiaroscuro, histrionic, mincing, maverick
-
Oooh, good word!
cloyless, laconic, pontificate, mawkish, pedantic, hubris, inchoate
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