as in aggressive
feeling or displaying eagerness to fight
clearly a writer with a chip on his shoulder, he's very agonistic even when stating indisputable facts
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of agonistic
Figure 1 Dominance hierarchy, agonistic behaviour, and physiological correlates in male captive kea at Willowbank Wildlife Reserve.
—
Grrlscientist,
Forbes.com,
25 Apr. 2026
Ong used the word agonistic; oral cultures are competitive.
—
Derek Thompson,
The Atlantic,
22 Feb. 2026
Many owners in the city feel stuck—the dog is trigger stacked from the urban environment and more likely to have agonistic reactions towards other dogs as a result.
—
Lucy Notarantonio,
MSNBC Newsweek,
27 Sep. 2025
The kitchen remains bloody and agonistic, demanding the preparation of yet another family meal.
—
E. Tammy Kim,
The New Yorker,
14 July 2023
The agonistic, Faulknerian circumstances fill the house with awful silences.
—
Matthew Gavin Frank,
Harper's Magazine,
21 Dec. 2022
Finally, serial attacks may signal the agonistic potential of a family to other flock members.
—
Ncbi Rofl,
Discover Magazine,
11 July 2012
Grrlscientist,
Forbes.com,
25 Apr. 2026
Ong used the word agonistic; oral cultures are competitive.
—
Derek Thompson,
The Atlantic,
22 Feb. 2026
Many owners in the city feel stuck—the dog is trigger stacked from the urban environment and more likely to have agonistic reactions towards other dogs as a result.
—
Lucy Notarantonio,
MSNBC Newsweek,
27 Sep. 2025
The kitchen remains bloody and agonistic, demanding the preparation of yet another family meal.
—
E. Tammy Kim,
The New Yorker,
14 July 2023
The agonistic, Faulknerian circumstances fill the house with awful silences.
—
Matthew Gavin Frank,
Harper's Magazine,
21 Dec. 2022
Finally, serial attacks may signal the agonistic potential of a family to other flock members.
—
Ncbi Rofl,
Discover Magazine,
11 July 2012
Recent Examples of Synonyms for agonistic
Adjective
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Grey-zone tactics refer to a range of aggressive tactics that vary from navy ship patrols to drone flights, but fall short of direct combat.
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That will be decided in the coming hours, as the Heat remains in aggressive pursuit of a trade for Antetokounmpo.
Adjective
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Fiber-optic, first-person view (FPV) drones have become a key weapon in the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah’s war against Israel in recent months – bypassing Israel’s sophisticated defense systems by duplicating an asymmetric warfare tactic that first emerged in the Russia-Ukraine war.
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Children of the 1960s may recall that even within the militant activist group, Students for Democratic Society (SDS), animus was frequently directed not at the establishment but at fellow antiwar advocates.
Adjective
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The complaint alleges that school officials at Southern Hills Middle School failed to stop two years of antisemitic harassment against an eighth grader even after investigations concluded the student faced a hostile environment.
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Create an internal incident map and begin tagging hostile actions according to the DISARM taxonomy.
Adjective
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This is not so different from the Founders’ vision of democracy, in which a federal system with independent, coequal branches of government forces collisions of competing interests that can get contentious, even chaotic, before compromises are forged.
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But with the Turnberry Agreement finally finding its footing, a reopening of wounds and a reignition of a contentious trade battle has likely held little appeal for the EU.
Cite this Entry
“Agonistic.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/agonistic. Accessed 2 Jul. 2026.
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