Hipster

Hipster, as used in the 1940s, referred to aficionados of jazz, in particular modern jazz, which became popular in the early 1940s. The hipster adopted the lifestyle of the jazz musician, including some or all of the following: manner of dress, slang terminology, use of cannabis and other drugs, relaxed attitude, sarcastic humor, self-imposed poverty, and relaxed sexual codes. Etymologically, the words hep and hip were derived from hepi, a word i... more

Hipster, as used in the 1940s, referred to aficionados of jazz, in particular modern jazz, which became popular in the early 1940s. The hipster adopted the lifestyle of the jazz musician, including some or all of the following: manner of dress, slang terminology, use of cannabis and other drugs, relaxed attitude, sarcastic humor, self-imposed poverty, and relaxed sexual codes. Etymologically, the words hep and hip were derived from hepi, a word in the West African language Wolof that means “to see” or hipi that means "to open one's eyes". The word was used in many African communities of the Diaspora since their time of transplantation from their original locale. In the early days of jazz, musicians were using the hep variant to describe anybody who was "in the know" about an emerging culture, mostly black, which revolved around jazz. They and their fans were known as hepcats. By the late 1930s, jazz and its variant Swing, had become popular among squares, the jazz culture became... less