Any label, any title, any phrase has a narrative. First it begins with the etymology – what it actually means – after which it strikes on to what that phrase stood for and what it grew into. Then, in some instances, it’s a must to trudge your means by way of the assorted generational meanings that happened, every decade a brand new group of individuals both accepting, rejecting or altering it. The phrase hippy is not any completely different.
For many years, even perhaps centuries, this phrase has been used to face for anti-establishment actions and free-thinking. Nevertheless, for some extra concerned in that institution, it’s also used as a derogatory label. Which means those that go in opposition to society and don’t need to align with its values. How can the phrase be two issues concurrently? Let’s delve deep into the reality behind the phrase: hippy.
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Etymology
Etymology, merely talking, is the research of the which means of phrases and the methods through which they’ve modified over time. How was a phrase created, and the way has that phrase meant various things in several moments in historical past. An instance of that is the phrase avocado. For almost all of the world, an avocado is a fruit (yep, it’s not a vegetable) that individuals get pleasure from with eggs for breakfasts, in smoothies or in salads. Nevertheless, the etymology of it’s fairly fascinating. Babbel writes:
“The phrase avocado comes from Spanish aguacate, which in flip comes from the Nahuatl ahuacatl, which means testicle. Stunned? Maybe, however the extra one thinks about it, the much less shocking it will get — they do quite resemble a person’s gentle spot, and this resemblance turns into much more pronounced once you see avocado duos dangling clumsily from timber.”
This new-found information could as effectively make you take a look at avocados otherwise subsequent time you’re utilizing them in a dish. However, as you’ll be able to see, the which means behind avocado has modified over time. These days, it might be unlikely for most individuals to know the etymology of the phrase, whereas in one other time it might have been.
Evolution of Phrases
The power to talk and talk is one thing that takes us away from a variety of different animals, and it has allowed us to construct civilizations, plan for the longer term, in addition to reminisce and study from the previous. However this additionally signifies that we now have round 7100 languages being spoken on the earth at present – all of that are evolving and altering to suit the trendy world. Science Node writes:
“Anybody who is aware of how ‘to google’, heard a ‘vuvuzela’, used ‘the grid’ or witnessed a ‘bromance’ will know {that a} language can change over time as effectively; new phrases frequently seem in our vernacular, phrases change their which means and previous phrases slowly die away.
Dictionaries attempt to carry on high of adjustments; round 2,000 new phrases have been added to the New Oxford American Dictionary in 2010 alone.”
It’s not solely new objects that have to be added to the dictionary, but additionally new fashions and traits. For instance, ‘twerking’ grew to become a well-liked hip-hop dance and was subsequently added to the listing of dictionary phrases. This was the identical with ‘selfie’, which has turn into so in style that it’s not possible to disregard.
The Phrase “Hippie”
It’s doable, nonetheless, for a phrase that has existed for hundreds of years to utterly change its which means. This will occur in a short time too. That is what occurred with the phrase hippy, in a means. Within the Sixties, hippy was getting used each as a label of delight, in addition to a derogatory time period. However let’s work out the place it stems from. One principle is that it derives from the phrase ‘hip’, which implies holding on-trend and in vogue. Nevertheless, in a way, that is the alternative of what hippies stood for. Being part of the hippy motion wasn’t about being in-fashion, it was about standing in opposition to the institution and all that got here with that. Based on World Wide Words, the phrase hippie was first recorded in print within the Nineteen Fifties so, earlier than then, it wasn’t getting used to the identical magnitude because it was about to be. Wikipedia writes:
“The phrases hipster and hippie derive from the phrase hip and the synonym hep… The phrases hip and hep first surfaced in slang across the starting of the twentieth century and unfold shortly, making their first look within the Oxford English Dictionary in 1904. On the time, the phrases have been used to imply “conscious” and “within the know”. Within the late Sixties, African language scholar David Dalby… claimed that hipi (a phrase within the Wolof language which means “to open one’s eyes”) was the supply for each hip and hep”
these supposed origins, it appears believable. You’ll agree that the hippie motion believed to be ‘within the know’ and have been ‘conscious’ of the truths behind the masks of capitalist, war-ridden society. As well as, the concept of opening somebody’s eyes to those truths additionally aligns fairly properly with that very same motion. Nevertheless, it’s additionally true that the phrase ‘hip’ is used to imply being modern. You could possibly think about your cringey grandpa coming residence sporting a cap and asking: do I look ‘hip’? So maybe we’ll have to go just a little deeper to know what the phrase hippie actually means. For this, we might want to know what it stood for and what it nonetheless does stand for.
The Hippie Motion
The hippie motion was born within the 50s-70s from turmoil and desperation, throughout a time when the world was polarized. Within the USA, there have been many teams being marginalized: the youths, ladies, and, in fact, none greater than these of coloration. The civil rights motion was maybe the most important battle, with many courageous people speaking to the road to try to create an epic shift in folks’s opinions. The goal was equality. This was what the hippie motion stood for. For folks of all races, colours, genders, skills, courses – to be handled the identical.
The height of the motion got here throughout the Vietnam Battle, the place a whole bunch of hundreds of self-proclaimed hippies went to Woodstock music pageant in 1969. Some unbelievable musicians performed, together with the likes of: Jimmy Hendrix, The Who and Jefferson Airplane. It was right here the place hippie tradition may very well be seen in full power. A great deal of folks, with colourful clothes and generally loopy hair, dancing and having fun with the numerous leisure substances that mom Earth can provide. Not solely that, however they have been in a position to converse and protest in opposition to the numerous wrongs in society on the time. There’s something price noting, nonetheless, and it’s best defined by Britanica:
“Hippies have been largely a white, middle-class group of youngsters and twentysomethings who belonged to what demographers name the baby-boom technology. They felt alienated from middle-class society, which they noticed as dominated by materialism and repression. Hippies developed their very own distinctive life-style, whereby they constructed a way of marginality. They experimented with communal or cooperative dwelling preparations”
There was a rising group of disillusioned middle-class youths in America who felt misplaced and with out goals. Plenty of these younger folks – angered by the obsession with possessions and the state of the world – began trying to find alternative routes to reside. Did the civil rights motion actually contain them? Not likely, no. Had been a variety of these folks poor? In all probability not. However while the actions that the hippie tradition stood for might not have all the time been immediately involving them, they nonetheless stood for them. This meant that, in the long run, the hippie motion type of encompassed everything of anti-establishment America – quite than solely the misplaced middle-class white youngsters. It was the beatles, it was the peace signal, it was “make love, not struggle”, it was free-thinking, it was intercourse, it was rock n roll.
Demonization
It was this all-encompassing definition that inevitably led to the phrase ‘hippie’ being weaponized by the federal government and the media. They noticed the hippie motion as a menace. They noticed all of it as one factor – Woodstock, civil rights, ladies rights, anti-war protests, rock n roll music – all of it went in opposition to the world the federal government wished to protect. Nixon’s struggle on medication and promotion of Center America was what started the demonization of the hippie motion. He proclaimed that he stood for the ‘Silent People’, the individuals who spent their time doing their duties and never complaining and disrupting harmless folks’s lives. This was how he obtained the help he wanted. His enemies have been the hippies and the civil rights motion. Nixon’s home coverage chief John Ehrlichman, stated:
“We knew we couldn’t make it unlawful to be both in opposition to the struggle or black, however by getting the general public to affiliate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. After which criminalizing each closely, we might disrupt these communities… We might arrest their leaders. raid their properties, break up their conferences, and vilify them night time after night time on the night information. Did we all know we have been mendacity in regards to the medication? In fact we did.”
This affiliation of medication, anarchy, aggression, irresponsibility and the hippie motion was a profitable smear marketing campaign. It received Nixon the election in 1968, in addition to altering the definition of hippie ceaselessly. While for a lot of it might all the time imply peace and love, for others it now stood for the exact opposite. Nonetheless to today, folks will throw the phrase hippie round to imply one thing derogatory and unfavorable.
Remaining Ideas
The which means of phrases will ceaselessly shift and alter, however there are pivotal moments in time the place occasions can radically alter their meanings. For ‘hippie’, it was the 60s. This era each created the phrase and destroyed it concurrently. The hippie motion stood in opposition to the highly effective institution and, in consequence, it was retaliated in opposition to with the total power of the police and the media. In fact there’s nonetheless time for the phrase ‘hippie’ to shift and alter however, for now, we should have a good time that there was a time when it stood for a lot and we will hope that it’ll as soon as once more.
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