antagonistic
Americanadjective
-
acting in opposition; opposing, especially mutually.
-
hostile; unfriendly.
adjective
-
in active opposition
-
mutually opposed
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of antagonistic
First recorded in 1625–35; antagonist + -ic
Explanation
If you're antagonistic, you're hard to get along with. Harmony is not your friend — you prefer hostility and struggle. If you're antagonistic to your little brother, you're always picking on him and giving him a hard time — causing him agony — a word that's buried in antagonistic. Even drugs or chemicals can be antagonistic: if you take a sleeping pill and then follow it with a few cups of espresso, the interaction is likely to be antagonistic. The sleeping pill and the caffeine struggle against each other and you're not likely to get much sleep.
Vocabulary lists containing antagonistic
Opposites Attract
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A Wrinkle in Time
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Divergent
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“Popular culture … and high culture … aren’t antagonistic to each other. They fit together somehow. They belong to different aspects of the same tradition,” he said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2026
This concept, known as antagonistic pleiotropy, was proposed by biologist Peter Medawar in 1952 as an explanation for aspects of aging.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 26, 2026
That ABC is running spots critical of a government agency shows how antagonistic the relationship between the network and the FCC has become.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 22, 2026
"Having a provocative and antagonistic performer is not illegal," he said.
From BBC ● May 19, 2026
The street the children, the fruit vender, the flowers growing there under her eyes, were all part and parcel of an alien world which had suddenly become antagonistic.
From "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
