alienate Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. verb arouse hostility or indifference in where there had formerly been love, affection, or friendliness
    alien; disaffect; estrange.
    • She alienated her friends when she became fanatically religious
  2. verb transfer property or ownership
    alien.
    • The will aliened the property to the heirs
  3. verb make withdrawn or isolated or emotionally dissociated
    • the boring work alienated his employees

WordNet

Al"ien*ate adjective
Etymology
L. alienatus, p. p. of alienare, fr. alienus. See Alien, and cf. Aliene.
Definitions
  1. Estranged; withdrawn in affection; foreign; -- with from.
    O alienate from God. Milton.
Al"ien*ate transitive verb
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Alienated present participle & verbal noun Alienating
Definitions
  1. To convey or transfer to another, as title, property, or right; to part voluntarily with ownership of.
  2. To withdraw, as the affections; to make indifferent of averse, where love or friendship before subsisted; to estrange; to wean; -- with from.
    The errors which . . . alienated a loyal gentry and priesthood from the House of Stuart. Macaulay.
    The recollection of his former life is a dream that only the more alienates him from the realities of the present. I. Taylor.
Al"ien*ate noun
Definitions
  1. A stranger; an alien. Obs.

Webster 1913