Hippie

Hippie (or sometimes "hippy") is a term originally used to describe some of the rebellious youth of the 1960s and 1970s. The word, "hippie" was coined by the late San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen. Though not a cohesive cultural movement with manifestos and leaders, hippies expressed their desire for change with communal or nomadic lifestyles, by renouncing corporate nationalism and the Vietnam War, by embracing aspects of non-traditional religious cultures, and with criticism of Western middle class values.

File:Flower-Power Bus.JPG

Flower-Power Bus

Such criticism included the views that the goverment was paternalistic, corporate industry was greedy and domineering, traditional morals were askew, and war was inhumane. The structures and institutions they rejected came to be called the establishment.

The term "hippie" has also been used in a derogatory sense, to describe long-haired unkempt drug users, who by beatnik standards was someone that was not "Hip" or "aware" or "clever" enough to really be "hip". Conservatives of the time (until recently) used the term "hippie" as an insult towards young liberals, though this use has declined (perhaps due to the conservative affiliation of aging hippies, or "yuppies"). To add to the confusion, many so-called hippies preferred to call themselves "freaks".

"Hippies" of the time were interested in "tuning in to their inner minds" (with drugs, mystic meditation, or a combination of both) and dropping out of mainstream society. This influence was from far eastern metaphysical and religious practices that were done mostly by monks and aboriginal shaman in the past. The inclusion of far eastern religious practice in religious circles of the 1970s became a New Age movement for Mystics and "Spiritual Seekers," as well as a joke for hipster comedians. A famous modern pop culture example of the word "hippie" as an insult is its use by the popular fictional television character Eric Cartman from South Park.

Origins

In the 1940s and 1950s the terms "hipster" and "beatnik" came into usage by the American beat generation to describe jazz and swing music performers, and evolved to also describe the bohemian-like counterculture that formed around the art of the time.

The 1960s hippie culture evolved from the beat culture, and was greatly influenced by changing music style and the creation of rock & roll from jazz.

The first use of the word Hippie on Television was on WNBC TV Channel 4 in New York City at the opening of the New York World's Fair in 1964, some young Anti-Vietnam War protesters with long hair like The Beatles were called Hippies by NYPD and reporters. The police swung their batons at them to chase them off the escalators and they fought back. They had long hair and beards and wore T-Shirts and Denim Jeans.

On the East coast of the U.S., in Greenwich Village, young counterculture advocates were called, and referred to themselves as "hips". To be "hip" meant at that time, "to be in the know". Young disaffected youth from the suburbs of New York City flocked to the Village in their oldest clothes, to fit into the counterculture movement, the coffee houses, etc. Radio station WBAI was the first media outlet to use the term "hippie" to describe the poorly-dressed middle class youths as a pejorative term originally meaning "hip wannabes".

September 6, 1965, marked the first San Francisco newspaper story, by Michael Fellon, that used the word "hippie" to refer to younger bohemians. The name did not catch on in mass media until almost two years later.

Hippie action in the San Francisco area, particularly the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, centered around the Diggers, a guerrilla street theater group that combined spontaneous street theater, anarchistic action, and art happenings in their agenda of creating a "free city". The San Francisco Diggers grew from two radical traditions thriving in the area in the mid-1960s: the bohemian/underground art/theater scene, and the new left/civil rights/peace movement.

Los Angeles also had a vibrant hippie scene in the mid-'60s, arising from a combination of the L.A. beat scene centered around Venice and its coffeehouses, which spawned the Doors, and the Sunset Strip, the quintessential L.A. hippie gathering area, with its seminal rock clubs, such as the Whisky-a-Go-Go, and the Troubadour just down the hill. The Strip was also the ___location of the actual protest referred to in the Buffalo Springfield's early hippie anthem of 1966, For What It's Worth.

Summer 1967 in Haight-Ashbury became known as the "Summer of Love" as young people gathered (75,000 by police estimates) and shared the new culture of music, drugs, and rebellion. However, the Diggers felt co-opted by media attention and interpretation, and at the end of the summer held a Death of Hippie parade.

The hippie movement reached its height in the late 1960s, as evidenced by the July 7, 1967 issue of TIME magazine, which had for its cover story: The Hippies: The Philosophy of a Subculture.

Because many hippies wore flowers in their hair and distributed flowers to passerby, they earned the alternative name, "flower children".

Politics

Hippies often participated in peace movements, including peace marches such as the USA marches on Washington and civil rights marches, and anti-Vietnam War demonstrations including the 1968 Democratic Convention. Yippies represented a highly politically active sub-group.

Though by 2005 standards, they were prone to sexism, the culture rapidly embraced feminism and egalitarian principles.

Though hippies embodied a counterculture movement, early hippies were not particularly tolerant of homosexuality. Acceptance of homosexuality grew with the culture.

Hippie political expression also took the form of "dropping out" of society to implement the changes they sought. The back to the land movement, cooperative business enterprises, alternative energy, free press movement, and organic farming embraced by hippies were all political in nature at their start.

Drugs

The drug use among the hippies is believed to be largely exaggerated by their Pro-Vietnam war opponents who tried to use a drug habits among hippies as an argument to disqualify their anti-war statements. But, driven by the appeal of the Sixties "drug guru", Harvard professor Timothy Leary, who advocated hallucinogenic drugs as a form of mind expansion, many hippies participated in recreational drug use, particularly marijuana, hashish, and hallucinogens such as LSD and psilocybin. Some hippies prize marijuana for its iconoclastic, illicit nature, as well as for its psychopharmaceutical effects. Although many hippies did not use drugs, drug use is a trait ascribed to hippies and as a reason for their disaffection for societial rules.

Drugs were, and still are, controversially considered a central theme in hippie culture.

Many people think that hippies did not smoke tobacco cigarettes, and considered tobacco dangerous, but photographs from the time show many hippies smoking cigarettes.

Legacy

By 1970, much of the hippie style, but little of its substance, had passed into mainstream culture. The media lost interest in the subculture, as it went out of fashion with younger people and even became the target of their ridicule with the advent of punk rock. However, many hippies made, and continue to maintain, long-term commitments to the lifestyle. As of 2005, hippies are found in bohemian enclaves around the world or as wanderers following the bands they love. Since the early 1970s, many rendezvous annually at Rainbow Gatherings to celebrate and pray for peace. Others gather at meetings and festivals celebrating life and love, such as the Peace Fest.

In the United Kingdom the New age travellers movement continued many hippie ideas into the 1980s and 1990s.

Characteristics

Longer hair and fuller beards than current fashion. People with curly or natty hair associated with the 1960s counterculture and civil rights movement wore their hair in afros. Some people find the longer hair offensive. They believe it is unhygienic, frivolous, or feminine; or offensive because it violates traditional cultural expectations. (When Hair moved from off-Broadway to a large Broadway theater in 1968, the hippie counterculture was already diversifying and fleeing traditional urban settings.)
Bright-colored clothing, and unusual styles, such as bell-bottom pants, tie-dyed garments, peasant blouses, and Indian-inspired clothing.
Listening to certain styles of music; psychedelic rock such as Jimi Hendrix and Jefferson Airplane, blues such as Janis Joplin, soulful funk like Sly & The Family Stone, and ZZ Top and jam bands like the Grateful Dead. Modern jam band counterparts are groups like Phish, String Cheese Incident, moe., the Black Crowes, or Goa trance music.
Performing music casually, often with guitars, in friends' homes, or for free at outdoor fairs such as San Francisco's legendary "Human Be-In" of January 1967, Woodstock, or contemporary gatherings like Burning Man festival.
The VW Bus is usually known as the counterculture/hippie symbol; a peace symbol is usually painted where the VW logo is usually seen. Because of its low cost (during the late sixties), it was revered as a utilitarian vehicle. A majority of buses were usually repainted with graphics and/or custom paint jobs - this was the predecessor of the modern-day art car.
Free love (See also: Sexual revolution).
Communal living
Incense

Neo-hippies

"Neo-hippie" is a name given to turn of the 21st century hippies, who retain some aspects of the 1960s hippie movement. Dreadlocks, especially with beads sewn into them, are popular among neo-hippies.

Some people also often consider modern day Goth kids or Emo kids to be this generation's hippies. They share many values with hippies of the 1960s, such as freedom of expression, i.e. wearing what they want and acting however they feel. The main difference was that while hippies often cared about politics and the direction of the world, these Neo-hippies usually don't have many political leanings.

Pejorative connotations

The term "hippie" is often used by more conservative or mainstream people with the pejorative connotation of participation in recreational drug use, at least to the extent of using marijuana, and choosing not to think or care much about work, responsibility, the larger society, or personal hygiene. It is also sometimes used as a derogatory term (often seriously and sometimes more in jest) by members of the punk rock subculture, usually used to describe something or someone seen as trite, pointless or boring.

External links

Bibliography

Dr. Kent, Stephen A. From slogans to mantras: social protest and religious conversion in the late Vietnam war era Syracuse University press ISBN 0-8156-2923-0 (2001)