Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Owing political allegiance to another country or government; foreign.
  • adjective Belonging to, characteristic of, or constituting another and very different place, society, or person; strange. synonym: foreign.
  • adjective Dissimilar, inconsistent, or opposed, as in nature.
  • noun An unnaturalized foreign resident of a country.
  • noun A person from another and very different family, people, or place.
  • noun A person who is not included in a group; an outsider.
  • noun A creature from outer space.
  • noun Ecology An organism, especially a plant or animal, that occurs in or is naturalized in a region to which it is not native.
  • transitive verb To transfer (property) to another; alienate.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To transfer or convey to another; make over the possession of: as, to alien a title or property. In this sense also written aliene.
  • To make averse or indifferent; turn the affections or inclinations of; alienate; estrange.
  • Residing under another government or in another country than that of one's birth, and not having rights of citizenship in such place of residence: as, the alien population; an alien condition.
  • Foreign; not belonging to one's own nation.
  • Wholly different in nature; estranged; adverse; hostile: used with to or from.
  • noun A foreigner; one born in or belonging to another country who has not acquired citizenship by naturalization; one who is not a denizen, or entitled to the privileges of a citizen. In France a child born of residents who are not citizens is an alien.
  • noun A stranger.
  • noun An English statute of 1836 (6 and 7 Wm. IV. c. 11) providing for the registration of aliens; and one of 1844 (7 and 8 Vict. c. 66) allowing aliens from friendly nations to hold real and personal property for purposes of residence, and resident aliens to become naturalized.
  • noun An English statute of 1847 (10 and 11 Vict. c. 83) concerning naturalization.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Not belonging to the same country, land, or government, or to the citizens or subjects thereof; foreign.
  • adjective Wholly different in nature; foreign; adverse; inconsistent (with); incongruous; -- followed by from or sometimes by to.
  • adjective (Law) one who owes allegiance to a government at war with ours.
  • noun A foreigner; one owing allegiance, or belonging, to another country; a foreign-born resident of a country in which he does not possess the privileges of a citizen. Hence, a stranger. See alienage.
  • noun One excluded from certain privileges; one alienated or estranged.
  • transitive verb rare To alienate; to estrange; to transfer, as property or ownership.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A person, animal, plant, or other thing which is from outside the family, group, organization, or territory under consideration.
  • noun A foreigner residing in a country.
  • noun Any life form of extraterrestrial origin.
  • adjective Pertaining to an alien.
  • adjective Very unfamiliar, strange, or removed.
  • verb transitive To estrange; to alienate.
  • verb law To transfer the ownership of something.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere
  • adjective being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world
  • adjective not contained in or deriving from the essential nature of something
  • verb transfer property or ownership
  • noun a person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your country
  • verb arouse hostility or indifference in where there had formerly been love, affection, or friendliness
  • noun anyone who does not belong in the environment in which they are found

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old French, from Latin aliēnus, from alius, other; see al- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Old French alien, aliene, from Latin aliēnus ("belonging to someone else, later exotic, foreign"), from alius ("other"), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂élyos.

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Examples

  • FACT: United States Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part VIII, Section 1324a, states: “It is unlawful for a person or other entity to hire for employment in the United States, an alien, knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien…

    WAR ON IMMIGRANTS 2006

  • FACT: United States Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part VIII, Section 1324a, states: “It is unlawful for a person or other entity to hire for employment in the United States, an alien, knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien…

    WAR ON IMMIGRANTS 2006

  • FACT: United States Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part VIII, Section 1324a, states: “It is unlawful for a person or other entity to hire for employment in the United States, an alien, knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien…

    WAR ON IMMIGRANTS 2006

  • FACT: United States Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part VIII, Section 1324a, states: “It is unlawful for a person or other entity to hire for employment in the United States, an alien, knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien…

    WAR ON IMMIGRANTS 2006

  • FACT: United States Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part VIII, Section 1324a, states: “It is unlawful for a person or other entity to hire for employment in the United States, an alien, knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien…

    WAR ON IMMIGRANTS 2006

  • MISCELLANEOUS WORDS. adobe _ado'ba_ algebra not _bra_ alien _alyen_, not _alien_ ameliorate _amelyorate_ antarctic _antarktik_ anti not _anti_ archangel _arkangel_ archbishop _arch_, not _ark_ arch fiend _arch_, not _ark_ architect _arkitect_ awkward _awkward_, not _ard_

    Practical Grammar and Composition Thomas Wood

  • Our buddy the margin alien is taking centre stage at another subcontinent for the next month.

    Archive 2005-03-01 2005

  • They accused Abu Hilala of using a word alien to Jordanian society, failing to respect journalistic objectivity and leaning toward the opposition.

    The Seattle Times 2011

  • They accused Abu Hilala of using a word alien to Jordanian society, failing to respect journalistic objectivity and leaning toward the opposition.

    KansasCity.com: Front Page 2011

  • They accused Abu Hilala of using a word alien to Jordanian society, failing to respect journalistic objectivity and leaning toward the opposition.

    KansasCity.com: Front Page 2011

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    January 15, 2010