stranger

Imagine walking through a busy market in a place you have never visited before. The people around you are not your friends, family, or neighbors. They are strangers because you do not know them. The word usually means a person who is unknown to you, not someone bad or dangerous by nature. You might help a stranger find the right street, or you might feel careful around strangers late at night. It can also describe how you feel in a new place, as in the idea of feeling like a stranger in a strange land.

The word "stranger" usually means a person you do not know. If someone is unknown to you and you have no personal relationship with them, that person is a stranger. This is the most common use. You might sit next to a stranger on a bus, ask a stranger for the time, or warn a child not to go off with strangers.

The word can also suggest someone who is new to a place, group, or situation. In that sense, a stranger may feel like an outsider because the people, rules, or customs are unfamiliar. A person who has just moved to a town may feel like a stranger there until they begin to know people.

"Stranger" is sometimes used in a more figurative way too. If you say someone is "no stranger to hard work," you mean hard work is familiar to them. If a person is "a stranger to fame," it means fame is something they have not known. The word can even describe emotional distance, as when two people who were once close begin to feel like strangers to each other.

In everyday English, though, the central idea stays the same: a stranger is someone outside your circle of familiarity. The word often carries a sense of distance, caution, curiosity, or the chance of a new connection, depending on the situation.