Home › Glossary › Letter E

estrangement

Concept
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A poetic technique making the familiar seem strange to renew perception

Detailed Definition
Estrangement (or defamiliarization) is a poetic technique that renders the familiar strange—through unusual diction, syntax, or perspective—to renew perception and disrupt habitual thinking, a concept central to Russian Formalism and modernist innovation.
Example
Example in poetry:
Estrangement: Poems using alienation or uncanny effects; Kafkaesque imagery creating distance; Surreal poems inducing cognitive estrangement; Lines emphasizing disconnection, e.g. “Stranger in my own mind”
Additional Notes
estrangement: The technique of "making strange" a familiar object or idea to give the reader a fresh perspective; aims to shake up automatic perception and is central to Russian Formalism.
Also Known As
Defamiliarization Making strange Alienation effect Ostranenie Defamiliarising image Alienation Exile
Skip to main content