prescriptive grammar is concerned with norms of or rules for correct usage.    From Wordnet, Princeton University. 

So long as writers have a basic competence in English, prescriptive grammar is largely a distraction that keeps them from focusing on the needs of their work.    From Wordnik.com.  [languagehat.com: GRAMMAR AND THE PRESCRIPTIVE ATTITUDE.] Reference

Burke would go to war for the idea of prescriptive right; Pitt declined to fight for the.    From Wordnik.com.  [Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 A series of pen and pencil sketches of the lives of more than 200 of the most prominent personages in History] Reference

What is at the heart of the discussion here is known as a prescriptive easement, a form of adverse possession.    From Wordnik.com.  [naplesnews.com Stories] Reference

First, it is prescriptive, which is to say that moral judgments express the will in a way analogous to commands.    From Wordnik.com.  [Religion and Morality] Reference

The grammar books you're used to are what linguists call prescriptive: that is, they prescribe rules for proper usage.    From Wordnik.com.  [Mental multivitamin] Reference

In the medieval trivium, however, grammar did not include the study of morphology and syntax; it was what would now be called prescriptive grammar.    From Wordnik.com.  [Literature: the very idea] Reference

Mr Omar was "prescriptive" and had robbed future Constitutional.    From Wordnik.com.  [ANC Daily News Briefing] Reference

There's a kind of prescriptive tone that I think men respond to more than women.    From Wordnik.com.  [CNN Transcript Apr 30, 2006] Reference

Hence, the BJCP guidelines set out "prescriptive" rules for having beer judged at homebrewing competition.    From Wordnik.com.  [Archive 2009-09-01] Reference

Ms. Solomon, an art historian and consultant who later advised Mr. Rockwell, bemoaned the emphasis on "prescriptive" equipment that could be used only in limited ways.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Architect-Designer] Reference

Is your doctor's approach "prescriptive" rather than.    From Wordnik.com.  [About.com Arthritis] Reference

Making the law "prescriptive" would make using that discretion more difficult, he said.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Latest From www.inthenews.co.uk] Reference

This doctrine, which is just as "prescriptive" as what it attacks, causes ignorance and confusion.    From Wordnik.com.  [Telegraph.co.uk - Telegraph online, Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph] Reference

In the less intense program ( "prescriptive"), JSOs remain housed with the general population of juvenile offenders.    From Wordnik.com.  [Denver Post: News: Breaking: Local] Reference

But the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) said the proposals are "prescriptive" and open the door to litigation.    From Wordnik.com. Reference

In fact I've a kind of prescriptive right to the job. ".    From Wordnik.com.  [The Man from the Clouds] Reference

Music, for Eschenbach, isn't prescriptive but individual.    From Wordnik.com.  [Can Christoph Eschenbach and the National Symphony Orchestra give each other a fresh start?] Reference

CONAN: Is there anything prescriptive in the papal letter?.    From Wordnik.com.  [Op-Ed: In Ireland, Pope's Letter Falls Short] Reference

All the servants had a prescriptive right to go to this fair; and.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866] Reference

So this guide is not prescriptive; this is not the "only way" to do it.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Project Gutenberg FAQ 2002] Reference

The philosopher has no prescriptive right to preempt the field of ethics.    From Wordnik.com.  [A Handbook of Ethical Theory] Reference

On either side of the crucifix stand in their prescriptive stations the Madonna and St. John.    From Wordnik.com.  [Russia As Seen and Described by Famous Writers] Reference

Why, they say the President, by a prescriptive rule that has been established since the time of.    From Wordnik.com.  [Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet An Autobiography.] Reference

"The U.S. model is very prescriptive," says Tracey Pierce, head of company services at the LSE.    From Wordnik.com.  [STOCKS: RED CHIPS RULE] Reference

The prescriptive unfavourable forecast of our author respecting political power in the hands of the.    From Wordnik.com.  [West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas] Reference

If you said there are about 50 ways to fail and almost no rewards for success, it is very prescriptive.    From Wordnik.com.  [Students Quiz Education Sec. Arne Duncan] Reference

You can't be too overly prescriptive because you don't want to seem like government is running everything.    From Wordnik.com.  [‘I Understand the Challenges People Face Every Day’] Reference

Prejudices, notions, prescriptive rules, may exist there, but these are not sufficient as guides of conduct.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Education of American Girls] Reference

The Abbots, without enjoying any prescriptive right, were summoned to Parliament in the reigns of Henry III.    From Wordnik.com.  [Bell's Cathedrals: The Abbey Church of Tewkesbury with some Account of the Priory Church of Deerhurst Gloucestershire] Reference

The proprietors may change, but the workmen remain, considering the salt-pans their prescriptive inheritance.    From Wordnik.com.  [Brittany & Its Byways] Reference

They seem, however, to claim a prescriptive right to the works of the British press, as well as to the funds of the.    From Wordnik.com.  [Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847] Reference

I think we at PG could get together a more or less prescriptive list of editing rules for new volunteers to follow.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Project Gutenberg FAQ 2002] Reference

CALIFORNIA GROWS OUT OF CONTROL: California has always relied on growth as the prescriptive for its budget problems.    From Wordnik.com.  [Falling On Hard Times: Four States Of Siege] Reference

I tried to apply the editing rules outlined on the PG site, though they weren't as prescriptive as I would have liked.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Project Gutenberg FAQ 2002] Reference

No merely prescriptive external rules, borrowed from society when the mothers were girls, can fully answer the purpose.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Education of American Girls] Reference

Although the report leaves the decision-making to politicians, it does get more prescriptive than previous academy climate studies.    From Wordnik.com.  [U.S. Scientists Urge Action On Climate Change] Reference

It is the problem of prescriptive, finger-wagging politics, indulged in on all sides, by all parties and factions and ideological sects.    From Wordnik.com.  [Prescription Politics] Reference

But we have not shaped a rigidly complete, prescriptive plan identifying exact measures for the cure of all present and future ills of the.    From Wordnik.com.  [The Nation's River A report on the Potomac from the U.S. Department of the Interior] Reference