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   al·ien·a·tion

   /ˌālēəˈnāSH(ə)n/

   noun

   • 1. the state or experience of being isolated from a group or an activity to which one should belong or in which one should be involved: "unemployment may generate a sense of political alienation" Similar isolationdetachmentestrangementdistanceseparationseverancepartingdivisiondivorcecutting offturning awaywithdrawalvariancedifferenceschism
   • ▪ loss or lack of sympathy; estrangement: "public alienation from bureaucracy"
   • ▪ (in Marxist theory) a condition of workers in a capitalist economy, resulting from a lack of identity with the products of their labor and a sense of being controlled or exploited.
   • ▪ a state of depersonalization or loss of identity in which the self seems unreal, thought to be caused by difficulties in relating to society and the resulting prolonged inhibition of emotion.
   • ▪ an effect, sought by some dramatists, whereby the audience remains objective and does not identify with the actors.
   • ▪ the transfer of the ownership of property rights. Similar transferconveyancepassing onhanding overdevolution

   Word Origin late Middle English: from Latin alienatio(n-), from the verb alienare ‘estrange’, from alienus (see alien). The term alienation effect (1940s) is a translation of German Verfremdungseffekt.

   Scrabble Points: 10

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