pedant

pedant
    n 1: a person who pays more attention to formal rules and book
         learning than they merit [syn: {pedant}, {bookworm},
         {scholastic}]
    

Pedant \Ped"ant\, n. [F. p['e]dant, It. pedante, fr. Gr.
   paidey`ein to instruct, from pai^s boy. See {Pedagogue}.]
   1. A schoolmaster; a pedagogue. [Obs.] --Dryden.
      [1913 Webster]

            A pedant that keeps a school i'th' church. --Shak.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. One who puts on an air of learning; one who makes a vain
      display of learning; a pretender to superior knowledge.
      --Addison.
      [1913 Webster]

            A scholar, yet surely no pedant, was he.
                                                  --Goldsmith.
      [1913 Webster] Pedantic
    

39 Moby Thesaurus words for "pedant":
      Babbitt, Gongorist, Marinist, Middle American, Philistine,
      anal character, bluestocking, bourgeois, burgher,
      compulsive character, conformer, conformist, conventionalist,
      euphuist, fine writer, formalist, methodologist, middle-class type,
      model child, organization man, parrot, perfectionist, phrasemaker,
      phraseman, phrasemonger, plastic person, precieuse, precieux,
      precisian, precisianist, precisionist, purist, rhetorician, sheep,
      square, teenybopper, trimmer, wordspinner, yes-man