What does hipness mean?
Hipness is an informal noun meaning fashionable style, trendiness, or awareness of current popular culture. A person may possess hipness, while a garment, song, or movement may display it. The word usually carries a mildly evaluative tone: praising something as hip suggests that it is fashionable, savvy, or culturally advanced, whereas calling it dated or out of touch can imply a loss of hipness. Because hipness became particularly associated with jazz, beatnik, hippie, and later youth cultures, it can also evoke the changing styles and attitudes of successive subcultures. In contemporary use, the expression is often retrospective or ironic, describing a period's supposedly fashionable qualities rather than identifying what is currently popular. It is related to the informal adjective hip, as in a hip outfit or a hip record, but as an abstract noun hipness emphasizes a quality, state, or cultural identity rather than simply labeling an individual thing.
nounThe quality of being fashionable, stylish, or up to date with current trends. It can also refer collectively to the attitudes, tastes, and cultural preferences regarded as fashionable.
- The quality of being fashionable, stylish, or up to date with current trends.
- The attitudes, tastes, and cultural preferences regarded as fashionable or culturally aware.
"The designer's vintage-inspired collection brought a touch of hipness to an otherwise conventional runway."
"The band's playful videos exemplified the hipness of early-1980s British pop culture."
"Her essay questioned whether genuine individuality had become a performance of hipness."
The regular plural is grammatically possible but is uncommon; hipness is normally used as an uncountable noun.
"The exhibition examined the changing hipnesses associated with jazz, disco, punk, and new wave."
Born from the jazz-era vocabulary of coolness and cultural awareness, hipness helped turn being in vogue into something that could be named and analyzed.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does hipness come from?
Hipness is a 20th-century English formation built on the informal adjective hip, meaning fashionable or aware of current trends, plus the suffix -ness, which forms a noun denoting a quality or state. The adjective hip developed through jazz and other African American and beat cultural vocabularies during the early 20th century, although its precise origin is disputed. The resulting noun became established in popular and critical commentary, especially during the 1960s and 1970s.
How hipness is actually used
An informal and generally evaluative word, hipness is now often dated or used ironically. It became especially prominent in British and American popular culture during the 1960s and 1970s and is usually treated as an uncountable noun.
Easily confused with hipness
Hipness means fashionable style or awareness of current trends, whereas hippiness means happiness.