Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Striving to overcome in argument; combative.
- adj. Struggling to achieve effect; strained and contrived.
- adj. Of or relating to contests, originally those of the ancient Greeks.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Pertaining to contests of strength or athletic combats, or to contests of any kind, as a forensic or argumentative contest.
- Combative; polemic; given to contending.
- Strained; aiming at effect; melodramatic.
- n. The act of combating or struggling; combat; struggle.
Wiktionary
- adj. Of or relating to contests that were originally participated in by the Ancient Greeks; athletic.
- adj. zoology, anthropology Characterised by conflict or hostility.
- adj. rhetoric Argumentative, combative.
- adj. pharmacology Pertaining to an agonist.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Pertaining to violent contests, bodily or mental; pertaining to athletic or polemic feats; athletic; combative; hence, strained; unnatural.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. striving to overcome in argument
- adj. struggling for effect
- adj. of or relating to the athletic contests held in ancient Greece
Etymologies
- From Ancient Greek ἀγωνιστικός. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“In an antagonistic what in biology is called agonistic encounter with another animal, a dog wants to appear to be the bigger, more powerful creature—so he makes a big-dog sound.”
“Burckhardt and Nietzsche were colleagues in Basel, and each developed an "agonistic" theory of society.”
The Washington Post: Book review of Hugh Trevor-Roper's "History and the Enlightenment"
“It's here that he rails for the umpteenth time against lesser critics who have dared to suggest that his boisterous, agonistic account of writerly influence might be weighted in favour of a certain masculinist tradition.”
The Guardian: The Anatomy of Influence by Harold Bloom – review
“Rush Limbaugh in my honest opinion I believe that you are just an agonistic pig, who do not have a heart.”
“Beyond this, however, Connolly's model of a pluralism that can legitimately admire a diversity of metaphysical perspectives (rather than simply tolerate them) looks rather like an agonistic version of”
“For market fundamentalists, life is an agonistic struggle of individuals, each of whom is fundamentally alone and solely responsible for her own life.”
The Huffington Post: Elissa D. Barrett: The Rest is Commentary: Jewish Post-Election Reflection
“One important hypothesis is that such signals impose social (or 'maintenance') costs incurred through repeated agonistic interactions with other individuals9, 10, 11, 12.”
“The idea that in such an agonistic system any truth or justice, or even true facts, reliably result is, to my mind, quite analogous to the muddle of “the invisible hand” in economics, or the idea that “competition” necessarily results in an optimal market.”
Justin Raimondo vs. Christopher Hitchens on al-Jazeera « Antiwar.com Blog
“A strictly atheistic or agonistic explanation is still always possible.”
God, Strings, Emergence, and the Future of the World By Nicola Hoggard Creegan
“Look elsewhere for agonistic social ontology: A response to Smith from The Immanent Frame posted by Nicholas Wolterstorff”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘agonistic’.
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Rare Words - A
Not just rare words, but thousands of RARE WORDS WITH DEFINITIONS.
If you want to see the definitions, too, go to
http://phrontistery.i...aba, abacinate, abactor, abaculus, abaft, abampere, abapical, abarticular, abasement, abasia, abask, abatis and 1214 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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phrontistery - a
from phrontistery.info
axilla, avalement, argil, argent, argand, arete, aretaics, areometer, areology, arenoid, arenaceous, arefy and 1214 more...
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Words-I-tend-to-forget
I have read them many times before and looked them up as well, and yet I forget their meaning. So, this list should collect them for me for revision.
glib, audacious, imminent, deflect, convention, calytrix, overbearing, regressive, condescending, crouch, impasse, agonistic and 11 more...
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Fancy Frills
Words I might not use in day to day language..
condescending, belligerent, antepenultimate, impasse, agonistic, decrepit, cathartic., Evanesce, dog ear, uber, gibber, audacious and 4 more...
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Remember Not To Forget
Sephardic, Umwelt, amphiboly, untrammeled, sequela, pandiculation, tensegrity, syncretism, pugilism, shemagh, disquisition, perspicacity and 65 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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strieale's Words
scientism, chronological, christophobia, subsurface, high culture, jeffersonian demo..., jacksonian democracy, incommensurable, rebuttal, discerning, disparate, anodyne and 156 more...
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stpeter's Words
abase, abasement, abashed, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abhorrent, abide, abject, ablation, abnegation and 3536 more...
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Zoological Terms
Terms used in Zoology
papilionaceous, actinost, gressorial, exuviate, nitid, trochal, demiss, loculus, crebrity, limes, pachytrichous, pachydactyl and 319 more...
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Miscellany, pt. a
afterdamp, abluent, acanthoid, aquiline, acaulescent, aesthetic evil, armillary, armozeen, astucity, athletary, aberrant, abeyant and 118 more...
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wolfson's Words
cicisbeo, animadversion, drupe, callipygian, rhadamanthine, poetaster, philosophaster, grammaticaster, lacuna, infralapsarian, incunabula, logorrhea and 142 more...
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ninaj's Words
ergo, fickle, thus, tenable, cabal, essentially, ejaculation, tabula rasa, pedantic, decommodification, incommensurable, tyrannicide and 10 more...
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moving driving words
act, active, actor, actual, actuary, actuate, agendum, agent, agile, agitate, allege, ambage and 47 more...
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perhapsolutely's Words
polyradiculoneuro..., abulia, abubble, abscission, abaft, zareba, abatis, abigail, abiogenesis, ablate, ablaut, abo and 1705 more...
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