alienar

In philosophy, sociology, and political theory, alienar describes the process by which a person becomes estranged from their own labor, identity, or society — the Spanish term for Marx's concept of alienation, la alienación. In ordinary speech it's used more loosely for feeling disconnected or like an outsider.

• El sistema capitalista, según Marx, aliena al trabajador de su propio trabajo. — According to Marx, the capitalist system alienates the worker from their own labor.
• Vivir tan aislado lo fue alienando poco a poco de sus amigos. — Living so isolated gradually alienated him from his friends.
• La publicidad puede alienar a los consumidores de sus verdaderas necesidades. — Advertising can alienate consumers from their real needs.

Confusing alienar with enajenar — both translate roughly as 'to alienate' and both appear in Marxist theory (trabajo alienado / trabajo enajenado are used near-interchangeably), but enajenar is the more common choice in legal contexts (transferring property), while alienar leans philosophical and psychological.

Often confused with enajenar.

• politics Teoría marxista de la alienación — Karl Marx's concept, developed in the 1844 Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts, describing how workers under capitalism become estranged (alienados) from their own labor, its product, and their fellow workers — still the standard reference point for the verb's philosophical sense in Spanish.