I bet y'all have been waiting with bated breath for my next post (probably not, but ya never know), seeing as how I haven't put anything new on here in a while. I've been kinda busy showing up for the craziness lately at the Texas Capitol. Maybe that has nothing to do with learning Polish, and shouldn't be in a Polish learning blog. Au contraire; I beg to differ. I studied Polish on several occasions while I was there, even while I was chanting along with the crowd. And, besides, it's my blog, so I can write what I want. Ha ha.
But I digress, let's get back to the topic at hand. I want to talk about "przeciw," which, in general, has to do with stuff that is opposite, contrary to, or against something. A fitting topic to talk about in relation to thousands of screaming protestors who shut this mother down. Yippie-ki-yay.
"Przeciw" or "przeciwko" means "against." It is a preposition, and takes the dative case. It also forms a prefix for a ton of compound words in Polish. I'm not going to go into all the words that are involved here, because there are a whole lot of them. Just turn to your friendly neighborhood Polish dictionary for further guidance on this subject. But I will talk about a few of the derivative words that are used most frequently.
"Przeciwny" means "opposite" or "contrary." "Przeciwnie" is an adverb that means "on/to the contrary." And "przeciwieństwo" is a noun that means "opposition" or "contrast." "Przeciwnik" refers to an "adversary" or "opponent" (another noun).
"Sprzeciw" is a noun that means "opposition" or "objection." "Naprzeciw" is a preposition meaning "opposite" or "across from." It takes the genitive.
"Sprzeciwiać/sprzeciwić się" means "to oppose, to stand against."
Some examples of how to stand tough against those who keep us in shackles:
powstawać przeciw - to rise against
protestować przeciw - to protest against
walczyć przeciwko - to fight against
głosować przeciwko - to vote against
w przeciwieństwie do - in contrast to
przeciwdziałać - to work against, to counteract
