Against

Against is a preposition.

Against: reactions

We use against to refer to negative, hostile or opposing reactions to situations, beliefs, people, events, etc.

Against with verbs

• Millions of people campaigned against the war.
• It’s not easy to go against your parents’ advice.
• That referee has something against our team. (he doesn’t like our team)

Here are some common verbs often followed by against:

act	decide	guard	speak out
advise	demonstrate	have something	struggle
argue	discriminate	protest	testify
be	fight	react	vote
campaign	go	rebel

Against with nouns

• Discrimination against people on the basis of race, age or gender is illegal.
• Everyone can be part of the fight against litter.
• The best protection against illness is a good diet and lots of exercise.

Here are some common nouns often followed by against:

accusation	campaign	discrimination	protest
action	case	evidence	reaction
aggression	charge	fight	rebellion
appeal	complaint	law
argument	defence	prejudice
battle	demonstration	protection

Against: physical contact

We often use against to talk about physical contact between two or more things:

• She was leaning against the wall reading a book. (there was contact between her and the wall)
• The bed was against the wardrobe. (there was contact between the bed and the wardrobe)

Against: competition

We often use against with verbs and nouns connected with sport and competitions, such as compete/competition, final, game, match, play, semi-final:

• Japan competed against Germany in the semi-final.
• England’s match against Jamaica was cancelled.

When we don’t use against

We use about, not against, to refer to taking action to solve problems:

• A: Did you enjoy last night?
• B: We enjoyed the food but the people at the table next to us were so loud that we couldn’t hear each other. We asked the waiter to do something about it but he said that he couldn’t.
• Not: We asked the waiter to do something against it

To make contrasts we use phrases such as contrary to, in contrast to and compared with, not against:

• My opinion is contrary to yours.
• Not: My opinion is against yours.

We don’t use against to talk about medication:

• Have you got something for a headache?
• Not: … something against a headache

Against: typical error

We use against, not with, in sport when two teams or individuals compete:

• All my family play tennis and sometimes we play against each other in competitions.
• Not: … we play with each other …