didactic
adjective
Richard C. LeineckerRobert B. HeilmanKirkus ReviewsPaul Lewis
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We Will Teach You the Origin of Didactic
Didaktikós is a Greek word that means "apt at teaching." It comes from didáskein, meaning "to teach." Something didactic does just that: it teaches or instructs. Didactic conveyed that neutral meaning when it was first borrowed in the 17th century, and still does; a didactic piece of writing is one that is meant to be instructive as well as artistic. Parables are generally didactic because they aim to teach a moral lesson. Didactic now sometimes has negative connotations, too, however. Something described as "didactic" is often overburdened with instruction to the point of being dull. Or it might be pompously instructive or moralistic.
Examples of didactic in a Sentence
Lawrence W. Levine, The Unpredictable Past, 1993
For two decades, many Americans, including some early advocates of the Vietnam intervention, have been relentlessly didactic, extracting cautionary lessons from Vietnam.
—George F. Will, Newsweek, 22 May 1989
—the trappings, one might say—of a didactic and resolutely pious Victorian sensibility in the service of an anarchic imagination.
—Joyce Carol Oates, The Profane Art, 1983
the poet's works became increasingly didactic after his religious conversion
David Sims, The Atlantic, 28 Mar. 2025
And the less said about the didactic, exasperating finale, the better.
—David Ehrlich, IndieWire, 14 Mar. 2025
There’s a didactic, Brechtian structure to the movie — Brecht is cited several times in the dialogue — in which Jude asks the viewer to question what the death of Ion means in a society wracked by rampant capitalism, racist nationalism and religious extremism.
—Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter, 19 Feb. 2025
Either way, that both these possibilities suddenly exist on screen bifurcates the story between two equally didactic possibilities when its strengths lie in lingering uncertainties.
—Siddhant Adlakha, Variety, 18 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for didactic
Cite this Entry
“Didactic.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/didactic. Accessed 22 Apr. 2025.
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didactic
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