Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

prescriptivist

/pɹəˈskɹɪp.tɪ.vɪst/

Word Rarity Very rare

Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.21 in modern English

Syllables: pre-scrip-tivist
IPA: /pɹəˈskɹɪp.tɪ.vɪst/

23

Scrabble Score

14

Letters

3

Syllables

8

Unique Chars

Meaning

noun

Someone who lays down rules regarding language usage, or who believes that traditional norms of language usage should be upheld.

adj

Having a tendency to prescribe.

Example Sentences

"The plutocratic tone and styptic wit of Safire and Newman and the best of the Prescriptivists is often modeled after the mandarin-Brit personas of Eric Partridge and H. W. Fowler, the same Twin Towers of scholarly Prescriptivism whom Garner talks about revering as a kid."
"In short, they tend to present Indian English as nothing more than "standard" English with a select collection of lexical peculiarities tacked on, as it were, many of which would be regarded as "errors" by prescriptivist language scholars."

Etymology

Etymology tree English prescriptive Proto-Indo-European *-id- Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-idyéti Proto-Hellenic *-íd͏̌d͏̌ō Ancient Greek -ῐ́ζω (-ĭ́zō) Proto-Hellenic *-tās Ancient Greek -τής (-tḗs) Ancient Greek -ῐστής (-ĭstḗs)bor. Latin -istader. Old French -istebor. Middle English -ist English -ist English prescriptivist From prescriptive + -ist.

Inflected Forms

prescriptivists (plural) more prescriptivist (comparative) most prescriptivist (superlative)

Frequently Paired Words

prescribe prescriptivism prescriptivistic grammarian

Synonyms

prescriptionist prescriptionistic prescriptivistic

Antonyms

descriptionist descriptivist descriptionistic descriptivistic

Questions

How do you pronounce prescriptivist?: The recorded pronunciation is /pɹəˈskɹɪp.tɪ.vɪst/.
What does prescriptivist mean?: Someone who lays down rules regarding language usage, or who believes that traditional norms of language usage should be upheld.
Where does prescriptivist come from?: Etymology tree English prescriptive Proto-Indo-European *-id- Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-idyéti Proto-Hellenic *-íd͏̌d͏̌ō Ancient Greek -ῐ́ζω (-ĭ́zō) Proto-Hellenic *-tās Ancient Greek -τής (-tḗs) Ancient Greek -ῐστής (-ĭstḗs)bor. Latin -istader. Old French -istebor. Middle English -ist English -ist English prescriptivist From prescriptive + -ist.

How to pronounce prescriptivist

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