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What does descriptivism mean?

Looking for the meaning or definition of the word descriptivism? Here's what it means.

Noun
  1. (linguistics) The practice of describing realistic forms, as opposed to prescribing idealistic norms, of linguistic usage.
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The second objection to rigidified descriptivism concerns the differences some have claimed between how names and rigidified descriptions embed under propositional attitude verbs.
In practice, dictionaries take a middle course between wholehearted descriptivism and prescriptive edicts.
And descriptivism may be the last refuge of the linguistic conservative after the former mistake has become the current rule.
Rigidity's work is compatible with descriptivism.
Not everyone, though, has rejected descriptivism.
American linguistics between the 1930s and 1950s was dominated by Bloomfieldian descriptivism.

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