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Centuries ago, whenever manuscript writers inserted special instructions or explanations into a book, they put them in red ink to set them off from the black used in the main text. (They used the same practice to highlight saints' names and holy days in calendars, a practice which gave us the term red-letter day.) Ultimately, such special headings or comments came to be called rubrics, a term that traces back to ruber, the Latin word for "red." While the printing sense remains in use today, rubric also has an extended sense referring to any class or category under which something is organized.
Examples of rubric in a Sentence
PC Magazine, 5 Apr. 2025
In conclusion, under the rubric of anti-white bias, meritocracy and the war on woke, these conservative elites have consolidated their power by galvanizing their base.
—James Unnever and Wayne Genthner, The Orlando Sentinel, 4 Apr. 2025
That the actual invasiveness of any minimally invasive BCI may not seem to matter very much anymore speaks to the need for such a rubric.
—Naveen Rao, Forbes.com, 2 Apr. 2025
Results also count toward the World Snowboard Points List, one of the rubrics used to determine national team selections for the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics.
—Michelle Bruton, Forbes, 7 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for rubric
Cite this Entry
“Rubric.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rubric. Accessed 16 Apr. 2025.
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