HIPSTER (CONTEMPORARY SUBCULTURE)

A 'hipster' is an individual who avoids and often explicitly rejects whatever is seen as mainstream or corporate in nature, instead embracing alternative forms of expression. Often, these alternative forms quickly become mainstream or corporate themselves, thus creating an arms race between the genuinely trendy and the "played out." Indeed, even the label "hipster" is no longer desirable, and it is rarely used for self-identification, except in an ironic or self-deprecating way.

Contents

History

Hipster Behavior

See also

Hipster Publications/Websites

References

History

"Hipster" derives from the word "hip." In the early days of jazz, musicians used the word "hip" to describe anybody who was "in the know" about the emerging, mostly African-American sub-culture, which revolved around jazz.^[1] They and their fans were known as "hepcats." Subsequently the word "hipster" was coined to replace "hepcat."
The first printed dictionary to list the word hipster is the short glossary "For Characters Who Don't Dig Jive Talk," published in 1944 with Harry Gibson's first album, "Boogie Woogie In Blue." The entry for "hipsters" defined it as "characters who like hot jazz." This short glossary of jive expressions was also printed on playbills handed out at Gibson's concerts for a few years. It was not a complete glossary of jive, as it only included jive expressions that were found in the lyrics to his songs.

Hipster Behavior

Norman Mailer’s 1957 essay, entitled “The White Negro: Superficial Reflections on the Hipster”, reflects on the racial role reversals and structural perversions embraced by the hipster subculture. ^[2][3]. Although Mailer's focus on racial roles has lost its relevance over time, the spirit of subversion, perversion, and reversal is still significant for the contemporary hipster.
For example, many modern hipsters identify themselves, if only superficially, with the working class. Pabst Blue Ribbon emerged from historically low sales after being adopted by the hipster subculture in Portland, Oregon. Executives of the company had noticed that sales were growing without explanation. Further research found a local Portland bar The Lutz had changed its offering to Pabst after a local beer went off the market. It was found that the local community was made up of a large counterculture along with working class people who had adopted Pabst.^[4] The popularity of Pabst has spread and it is now a popular beer among hipsters.
Likewise, Christian Lorentzen of Time Out New York sees metrosexuality as the hipster appropriation of gay culture. But for Lorentzen, the modern hipster drinks in underground culture with a heavy dose of irony and insincerity. He writes that "these aesthetics are assimilated — cannibalized — into a repertoire of meaninglessness, from which the hipster can construct an identity in the manner of a collage, or a shuffled playlist on an iPod."[1]

See also

★ Indie (music)

★ Indie (culture)

★ Independent film

★ DIY culture

★ No Wave

★ Kitsch

★ Camp (style)

Hipster Publications/Websites

★ The Fader

★ Vice Magazine

★ Pitchfork Media

★ Ignore Magazine

★ Brooklyn Vegan

★ Paper Magazine

★ Mass Appeal

References

1. http://www.hyzercreek.com/harryautobio.htm
2. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2278/is_2_28/ai_108114700
3. http://web.mit.edu/gtmarx/www/whitenegro.html
4. Portland Oregonian.