/ English Dictionary |
ALIEN
Pronunciation (US): | (GB): |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere
Synonyms:
alien; extraterrestrial; extraterrestrial being
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("alien" is a kind of...):
hypothetical creature (a creature that has not been observed but is hypothesized to exist)
Derivation:
alien (being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world)
Sense 2
Meaning:
A person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your country
Synonyms:
alien; foreigner; noncitizen; outlander
Classified under:
Nouns denoting people
Hypernyms ("alien" is a kind of...):
traveler; traveller (a person who changes location)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "alien"):
au pair (a young foreigner who lives with a family in return for doing light housework)
deportee; exile (a person who is expelled from home or country by authority)
gringo (a Latin American (disparaging) term for foreigners (especially Americans and Englishmen))
import; importee (an imported person brought from a foreign country)
metic (an alien who paid a fee to reside in an ancient Greek city)
Derivation:
alien (being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Anyone who does not belong in the environment in which they are found
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Nouns denoting people
Hypernyms ("alien" is a kind of...):
interloper; intruder; trespasser (someone who intrudes on the privacy or property of another without permission)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "alien"):
foreigner; outsider (someone who is excluded from or is not a member of a group)
Derivation:
alien (being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world)
II. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world
Example:
exotic cuisine
Synonyms:
alien; exotic
Classified under:
Similar:
foreign; strange (relating to or originating in or characteristic of another place or part of the world)
Derivation:
alien (a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere)
alien (a person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your country)
alien (anyone who does not belong in the environment in which they are found)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Not contained in or deriving from the essential nature of something
Example:
jealousy is foreign to her nature
Synonyms:
alien; foreign
Classified under:
Similar:
extrinsic (not forming an essential part of a thing or arising or originating from the outside)
III. (verb)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Transfer property or ownership
Example:
The will aliened the property to the heirs
Synonyms:
alien; alienate
Classified under:
Verbs of buying, selling, owning
Hypernyms (to "alien" is one way to...):
transfer (cause to change ownership)
Sentence frame:
Somebody ----s something
Context examples:
Suddenly I became aware of him, leaning back from the table and listening curiously to our alien speech of a world he did not know.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
“I was not aware that there was any individual, alien to this tenement, in your sanctum.”
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
And I do not want a stranger—unsympathising, alien, different from me; I want my kindred: those with whom I have full fellow- feeling.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Remote and alien as a traveller from another planet, he snarled down their soft-spoken love-words.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
But White Fang, uncompanionable, solitary, morose, scarcely looking to right or left, redoubtable, forbidding of aspect, remote and alien, was accepted as an equal by his puzzled elders.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
Let's see them aliens.
(Millions don't turn up to 'storm' US airbase for extraterrestrial evidence, Wikinews)
The object's odd characteristics — resembling both a comet and an asteroid — led researchers to question what it was; there was even speculation it was an alien spacecraft.
('Oumuamua interstellar object was not an alien spacecraft, National Science Foundation)
Clouds and hazes create a variety of complicated effects that researchers must work to disentangle from the signature of these alien atmospheres, and thus present a major obstacle for understanding transit observations.
(Sunsets on Titan reveal the complexity of hazy exoplanets, NASA)
Amid efforts to find alien life, scientists have not yet confirmed the existence of an extraterrestrial civilization.
(Finding Alien Life Unlikely Due to Lack of Phosphorus in Universe, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)
He could read English, but he saw there an alien speech.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)