# alien



## Outsider

How do you say "alien", in the sense of a being from another planet?

In Portuguese there is the word *alienígena*, which I believe is a cognate of the English word. But this is used almost exclusively in science fiction literature. Most people would be more likely to say *extraterrestre*, "extra-terrestrial", or simply *monstro*, "monster", if it's in the context of a horror story, like the film with the same name.

I'm primarily interested in the word, rather than the film. (In Portugal the film _Alien_ was dubbed _Alien—O oitavo passageiro_, which means _'Alien'—The eighth passenger_. The title was not translated literally.)

Thanks in advance.


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## kusurija

In Czech: 
"alien", in the sense of a being from another planet - mimozemšťan -word-to-word ~"extra-terrestrial" (ET); being concretely from Mars - Marťan. As translation of films name it would be *vetřelec* (also means intruder, invader...)

In Lithuanian: "alien", in the sense of a being from another planet - extraterestrian, but this is alien word in Lihuanian. Being concretely from Mars - Marsietis. Also can be said by describing: "nežemiška butybė" but it sounds somewhat strange. As translation of films name it would be *svetimas *(stranger). Maybe someone can remember better word, but this minute I don't remember such.


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## Grop

It's pretty much the same in French as in Portuguese, except the word _alien _only refers to the monsters in the Alien series (Starting with _Alien, Le huitième passager_) or to very similar monsters from other settings (a huge monster with lots of tentacles would not be called _un alien_).

The most generic word would be _extraterrestre _too, or _monstre _for a monstruous ET.

Edit: I agree with Fred - French _alien _is just a borrowing from English that is useful when talking about the Alien series, just like _blob _is useful when talking about the monster in The Blob, or _wookie _and _ewok _are useful when talking about Starwars. That's pop culture vocabulary.


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## Outsider

Grop said:


> It's pretty much the same in French as in Portuguese, except the word _alien _only refers to the monsters in the Alien series (Starting with _Alien, Le huitième passager_) or to very similar monsters from other settings (a huge monster with lots of tentacles would not be called _un alien_).
> 
> [...]
> 
> French alien is just a borrowing from English that is useful when talking about the Alien series, just like blob is useful when talking about the monster in The Blob, or wookie and ewok are useful when talking about Starwars. That's pop culture vocabulary.


That is also the case in Portuguese. 

Does French have a cognate of _alienígena_?


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## Fred_C

Grop said:


> It's pretty much the same in French as in Portuguese, except the word _alien _only refers to the monsters in the Alien series (Starting with _Alien, Le huitième passager_) or to very similar monsters from other settings (a huge monster with lots of tentacles would not be called _un alien_).
> 
> The most generic word would be _extraterrestre _too, or _monstre _for a monstruous ET.


 
Except that the word "alien" is not French, and is a borrowing from English, whereas in Portuguese, the word alienìgena if I understood it well is indeed real Portuguese.


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## mgwls

In Spanish we have the word _alienígena_ (we also use "alien" though), but far more common is _extraterrestre_. There is the term _marciano_ as well, which actually refers to somebody or something that comes from Mars, but which a lot of people use to encompass anything originating outside the Earth. Also, we often use the acronym _ovni_ which stands for _objeto volador no identificado_ (UFO in English) but nonetheless isn't limited to _platillos voladores_ (alien spaceships - flying saucers) in common usage but is used with the same meaning as _extraterrestre_.


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## Tamar

In Hebrew alien is  חייזר [khayzar/kheyzar]. It's one word, but was made by using two words: 
חי [khay] alive and זר [zar] foreign.


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## elroy

Arabic: كائن فضائي (_kaa'in faDaa'i_), lit. "space creature"


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## irene.acler

In *Italian* we say: _alieno_, _extraterrestre, marziano_ (coming from Mars).


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## krolaina

Spanish: alienígena, extraterrestre, marciano (same as in italian, with "c").
Irenilla, why are they in green if Mars is red?


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## Setwale_Charm

Russian: пришелец


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## Sionees

Welsh 

Bod arall-fydol > an other-worldly being.

(Sorry, I don't know if there's a hyphen in English, there is in Welsh...


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## Setwale_Charm

Sionees said:


> Welsh
> 
> Bod arall-fydol > an other-worldly being.
> 
> (Sorry, I don't know if there's a hyphen in English, there is in Welsh...


 
I am delighted to find someone who seems to knwo Welsh better than English 


Estonian: tulnukas.


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## Sionees

Diolch setwle x12. That's my shorthand for saying "thanks" in 12 langs - which I can do. Do I say shukria or shukran to you? I actually learnt English when I entered primary school about 35 years ago as my first foreign language. If you check me out you will work out Welshicsms in my English ;-)


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## Setwale_Charm

Sionees said:


> Diolch setwle x12. That's my shorthand for saying "thanks" in 12 langs - which I can do. Do I say shukria or shukran to you? I actually learnt English when I entered primary school about 35 years ago as my first foreign language. If you check me out you will work out Welshicsms in my English ;-)


 
Amazing!!! I am from Devonshire... born abroad, spoke three languages including English and Gaelic as mothertongues and it has always been my cherished dream to learn Welsh, one of my native languages ethnically...but what with the complete lack of sources...and even though I have met people speaking Welsh, it would always be No 2 after English....


But we are offtoping...

 To rectify things, here is the Latvian version:
ārzemnieks


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## sokol

In German this is difficult to tell as the English term - Alien - seems to finally have entered the German language: it is now possible to speak of 'Aliens' (pronounced somewhere in-between what you would expect from English and German general pronunciation rules). Even if you are not talking about that specific film.
(I've heard it especially from the younger generation, especially from people who love to play computer games with ... aliens in them, of course. But even German Wiki already mentions the term Alien.)

But generally in German an extraterrestrial would be called _(der_ or _die)_ _Ausserirdische_.

In science-fiction literature there also exist a great many other terms - as you would expect. In translated pieces of literature (especially from English provenience) usually the term used in the original language is not translated, therefore English 'xenoc' (used at least by one author meaning 'aliens' in general) became German 'Xeno (sg.) Xenos (pl.)' - and then of course there are many other names for specific extraterrestrials (like Marsians > Marsianer).


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## Grop

(@Setwale - This is like the story of many native French speakers who are ethnically somethingelse speakers)

I forgot to mention that French _alien _is not pronouced like the English word, nor is it pronounced like a plain old French word: it doesn't rhyme with _lien_, as there is no nasal vowel in it. I think the IPA would be [aljɛn], althoug I am not very good at IPAese.

(Outsider, I pointed you to French _aliéner _and _aliéné_. I spent a few minutes on _néandertalien_, which doesn't seem to be related at all - alas, that would have made a good story ).


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## anikka

*To rectify things, here is the Latvian version:
ārzemnieks*

To tell you the truth - ārzemnieks, is a foreigner, in the sence he's comming from abroad, not from another plantet
that would be - citplanētietis (from cita - another, planēta - planet)


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## Frank06

Hi,

In *Dutch *it would be _(een) buitenaards wezen_ (lit. extraterrestrial being), The alien in the movie _Alien_ (which doesn`t get translated in Dutch) would be "een buitenaards monster".

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Piotr_WRF

In Polish it's _kosmita_ (sg.) and _kosmici_ (pl.), derived from _kosmos_ of course (_cosmos_ in English). The movie was called _Obcy_, which literally means _stranger_ or _foreigner_. It seems that it's quite common now to call outer space aliens _obcy_ too, maybe because of the movie.


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## Kanes

Bulgaria:
izv'n zemno - out of worlder(neutral gender)


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## Nizo

In *Esperanto*:  _eksterterano_.


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## Nanon

Outsider said:


> Does French have a cognate of _alienígena_?



"Aliénigène" is "googlable", if I may use two neologisms in the same sentence!... But it is not found in the dictionary, and not very frequent.
Contexts for "aliénigène" seem quite esoterical.


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## Halibut

Swedish: _utomjording_, which is a direct translation of extraterrestrial (cf. _Jorden_ 'the Earth')


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## apmoy70

Greek:

*«Εξωγήινος, -νη, -νο»* [e.k͜sɔˈʝi.i.nɔs] (masc.), [e.k͜sɔˈʝi.i.ni] (fem.), [e.k͜sɔˈʝi.i.nɔ] (neut.) which is a modern translation of the Eng. extraterrestrial.


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## AndrasBP

Hungarian:

*földönkívüli*, from "föld" (= earth) and "kívül" (= outside)


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## Armas

Finnish:

*avaruusolento* < _avaruus_ "space" + _olento_ "being"


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## hui

Armas said:


> Finnish:
> 
> *avaruusolento* < _avaruus_ "space" + _olento_ "being"


It seems that nowadays, *alien* can be used, too.


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## Agró

Basque:

*Estralurtar*

Estra-: outside
lur: earth
-tar: suffix denoting origin

From outside the earth.


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## SuperXW

Chinese: 外星人 (wai4 xing1 ren2)
外: outer, other
星: star, planet
人: human, person, people


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## Rallino

Turkish: _*uzaylı* _(spaceborn/originating from space).

Alternatively: _*dünya dışı varlık*_ (outwordly entity).


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