Acquaintance vs Stranger - What's the difference?
acquaintance | stranger |
(uncountable) A state of being acquainted, or of having intimate, or more than slight or superficial, knowledge; personal knowledge gained by intercourse short of that of friendship or intimacy
* 1799 , '', in ''The Works , Volume 6,
(countable) A person or persons with whom one is acquainted.
* 1848 , , Chapter XVI:
(strange)
* Truth is stranger than fiction. (English proverb)
A person whom one does not know; a person who is neither a friend nor an acquaintance.
:
*
*:In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.Strangers might enter the room, but they were made to feel that they were there on sufferance: they were received with distance and suspicion.
An outsider or foreigner.
*(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
*:I am a most poor woman and a stranger , / Born out of your dominions.
* (1666-1735)
*:Melons on beds of ice are taught to bear, / And strangers to the sun yet ripen here.
*1961', : “”
A newcomer.
*, chapter=7
, title= (lb) One who has not been seen for a long time.
:
(lb) One not belonging to the family or household; a guest; a visitor.
*(John Milton) (1608-1674)
*:To honour and receive / Our heavenly stranger .
(lb) One not privy or party an act, contract, or title; a mere intruder or intermeddler; one who interferes without right.
:
Stranger is a antonym of acquaintance.
As nouns the difference between acquaintance and stranger
is that acquaintance is a state of being acquainted, or of having intimate, or more than slight or superficial, knowledge; personal knowledge gained by intercourse short of that of friendship or intimacy while stranger is a person whom one does not know; a person who is neither a friend nor an acquaintance.As an adjective stranger is
comparative of strange.As a verb stranger is
to estrange; to alienate.acquaintance
English
(Webster 1913)Alternative forms
* acquaintaunceNoun
(en noun)- I know of the man; but have no acquaintance with him.
page 22:
- Contract no friend?hip, or even acquaintance , with a guileful man : he re?embles a coal, which when hot burneth the hand, and when cold blacketh it.
- Montgomery was an old acquaintance of Ferguson.
Usage notes
* Synonym notes: The words acquaintance , familiarity, and intimacy mark different degrees of closeness in social intercourse. Acquaintance arises from occasional intercourse; as, our acquaintance has been a brief one. We can speak of a slight or an intimate acquaintance. Familiarity is the result of continued acquaintance. It springs from persons being frequently together, so as to wear off all restraint and reserve; as, the familiarity of old companions. Intimacy is the result of close connection, and the freest interchange of thought; as, the intimacy of established friendship.Synonyms
* familiarity, fellowship, intimacy, knowledge * See alsoDerived terms
* nodding acquaintanceReferences
* *stranger
English
Adjective
(head)Derived terms
* See strangeNoun
(en noun)The Mirror and the Lamp, passage=[…] St.?Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of the railway viaduct, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger' s mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit.}}
