conflict

plural conflicts

1. countableuncountableA clash or disagreement, often violent, between two or more opposing groups or individuals.

   The conflict between the government and the rebels began three years ago.

   1 more example

   One particularly damaging, but often ignored, effect of conflict on education is the proliferation of attacks on schools[…]as children, teachers or school buildings become the targets of attacks. Parents fear sending their children to school. Girls are particularly vulnerable to sexual violence.

   2013 July 19, Mark Tran, “Denied an education by war”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 1

2. countableuncountableAn incompatibility, as of two things that cannot be simultaneously fulfilled.

   I wanted to attend the meeting but there's a conflict in my schedule that day.

3. countableuncountablein fiction/literature, opposing forces that create uncertainty as to whether the character(s) will achieve their goal(s).

present singular third person conflicts · participle present conflicting · participle past conflicted · past conflicted

1. intransitiveTo be at odds (with); to disagree or be incompatible

   [T. E.] Lawrence said that in the end he felt himself to be fighting not for the imperial British but for the rebellious Arabs. All too often he conflicted with British bureaucratic fustiness.

   2014 March 2, Jan Morris, “Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson, review: A skilful account of T. E. Lawrence and his role in the painful birth of an emerging Middle East [print version: A rock in Arabia's shifting sands, 1 March 2014, p. R26]”, in The Daily Telegraph (Review)

2. intransitiveTo overlap (with), as in a schedule.

   It appears that our schedules conflict.

   1 more example

   Your conference call conflicts with my older one: please reschedule.