How to Use antagonism in a Sentence

antagonism

noun
  • The region has a long history of ethnic antagonisms.
  • The stakes are too high to let the antagonism continue any longer.
    — Sarah Garland, Scientific American, 14 Dec. 2020
  • There is a lot of antagonism in the scenes between you and many of your opposites.
    — Natalina Lopez, Town & Country, 31 May 2017
  • There was a twinge of antagonism in her touch, her hands directing him, yanking at him to stay still.
    — Ayşegül Savaş, The New Yorker, 24 Jan. 2022
  • There has been too much antagonism in wholesale channels - a problem that has lived on for decades.
    — Nikki Baird, Forbes, 5 Sep. 2021
  • There’s something to be said for public restraint in the face of antagonism.
    — The Denver Post Editorial Board, The Denver Post, 27 Feb. 2017
  • There's certainly no small amount of antagonism between the two sides at present.
    — Ben Westcott, CNN, 30 July 2021
  • All that antagonism may explain why the term is so backloaded.
    — Greg Stohr, Anchorage Daily News, 2 June 2022
  • Some work antagonism is just due to a personality clash, which is hard to fix.
    — Peter Jones, USA TODAY, 31 Oct. 2017
  • Fears are deepening that the current outbreak of antagonism could drag down the rest of the world.
    — Peter S. Goodman, BostonGlobe.com, 16 June 2018
  • But Geto Boys’ dank, hooky antagonism stayed in the spotlight.
    — August Brown, latimes.com, 10 June 2019
  • But the cuts, in many ways, appear to be rooted in a similar antagonism.
    — Nicholas Florko, The Atlantic, 2 Apr. 2025
  • Djokovic has made an art out of defying hostile crowds, thriving on the antagonism.
    — Charlie Eccleshare, The Athletic, 13 July 2024
  • And even though there’s a bit of antagonism, actually, the banter is quite fun.
    — Georg Szalai, The Hollywood Reporter, 25 Feb. 2025
  • The big surprise was how joint membership of the bloc helped bring an end to old antagonisms between the two countries.
    — Paul Hannon, WSJ, 22 Mar. 2018
  • The lions/lambs/liars antagonism replaces the old battle between hawks and doves.
    — Armond White, National Review, 17 May 2023
  • Time for all the antagonism to cease, the yelling to quiet, the division to fall apart, into unity.
    — Paul Daugherty, Cincinnati.com, 25 Sep. 2017
  • That antagonism would lead to one of the country’s earliest vaccine fights.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 14 Oct. 2021
  • In the late 1580s, their antagonism broke out into a brawl fought with pens instead of swords.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 19 Mar. 2021
  • Things change, and antagonisms and jealousies and resentments that weren’t there before emerge.
    — Jennifer Wilson, New Yorker, 28 Sep. 2025
  • During this car ride, the antagonism between the two men vanishes.
    — Justin Kroll, Deadline, 2 June 2026
  • Daniel finally gets the full scope of their antagonism, which means their burden is now to convince him of their righteousness.
    — Rafaela Bassili, Vulture, 10 Sep. 2025
  • Page and Pine have a blast playing off their antagonism; even Edgin knows Xenk should be the hero of this movie.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 28 Mar. 2023
  • The resulting reactionary war on culture turned out to be much bigger than antagonism against punk.
    — Matthew Wills, JSTOR Daily, 31 Aug. 2025
  • The bill also serves as a strong response of sorts to the Supreme Court’s hints of antagonism towards other rights.
    — Matt Ford, The New Republic, 19 July 2022
  • But the president’s antagonism to the policies of his predecessor and the trade status quo are well known.
    — Jon Talton, The Seattle Times, 8 July 2017
  • And those forces’ arrival comes at a time of rising antagonism between Belarus and Ukraine.
    — Nabih Bulos, Los Angeles Times, 9 Feb. 2022
  • The sense that between the city and the countryside, there’s this immense distance and antagonism and that truth is so unstable.
    — Literary Hub, 13 Nov. 2025
  • Heading in, Republicans don’t seem eager to echo the antagonism from the right.
    — Burgess Everett, semafor.com, 15 Sep. 2025
  • There are subtle signs that the mood in Washington may be starting to shift away from the last few years of competitive antagonism.
    — Kate Aronoff, The New Republic, 17 Nov. 2022

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'antagonism.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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