noun a follower of the beat generation (avant-garde 'visionaries, rebels and hipsters') derided and defined by stereotypical appearance (black beret for men, black tights for women) and lifestyle choices (Charlie Parker's jazz, marijuana, performance poetry, etc). Coined in 1958 (the first popular, non-Russian use of the suffix -NIK) by San Francisco newspaper columnist Herb Caen, extended from BEAT (a member of the 1950s youth counterculture), and a pun on the FAR OUT example of 'sputnik' (a Russian satellite launched in 1959) US, 1958