One way to picture it: two sides standing face to face, neither backing away — the moment a disagreement stops being and turns into a direct clash.

兩邊面對面站著,誰也不肯退開,中間那條原本可以繞過去的路被關掉了。confrontation 不是普通的意見不合——意見不合可以各自嘀咕、可以避開;confrontation 是雙方正面碰上,情緒上來,攤開來對峙。這個「面對面、不迴避」的畫面既可以是辦公室裡的一場爭吵,也可以是邊界上兩支軍隊互相瞪著。

From the word’s history

From confront, ultimately Latin frons/frontis 'forehead, front' with con- 'together': to put foreheads together — to face someone directly.

字根來自拉丁文 frons/frontis(額頭、前面),加上 con-(一起):字面就是「把額頭湊在一起」,也就是正面對上。同一條根給了英文 front、frontier、affront,都帶著「前面、正面」的意思。這解釋了為什麼 confrontation 天生帶著「面對面」的張力,而不只是「不同意」。

Wiktionary: confrontation < French confrontation; confront < Medieval Latin confrontari (com- + frons, frontis 'forehead, front')

One branch

面對面對上

登入就可以看這一支怎麼連回核心畫面。

angry disagreement · noun · C2

A situation in which there is a lot of angry disagreement between two people or groups.

衝突

原始詞典資料2 筆記錄

以下是外部詞典記錄的用法,摘錄並精簡格式,我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的;有些用法可能上面已經講過了。

confrontationnoun/ˌkɒn.fɹənˈteɪ.ʃən/

  • 1

    The act of confronting or challenging another, especially face to face.

    • During the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s, this commitment brought him into frequent critical confrontation with entrenched forms of conservative thinking (in academic areas from history and social science to the more abstract domains of ethical and political philosophy)[…]
  • 2

    A conflict between armed forces.

摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary,已精簡格式;依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用,改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。