Link Centre Dictionary

descriptive

desc·rip·tive

UK/dəˈskɹɪptɪv/ US/diˈskɹɪptɪv/ rare

adjective

1.

serving to describe or inform or characterized by description

  • “the descriptive variable”
  • “a descriptive passage”
Antonyms
2.

concerned with phenomena (especially language) at a particular period without considering historical antecedents

  • “synchronic linguistics”
  • “descriptive linguistics”
Synonyms
Antonyms
3.

describing the structure of a language

  • “descriptive linguistics simply describes language”
Antonyms

Origin

From Latin dēscriptīvus (“containing a full description”).

Phrases

  • descriptive adjective
  • descriptive ethics
  • descriptive geometry
  • descriptive statistics

Related words

Word family

See also

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.