Gopnik

A gopnik, (feminine: gopnitsa) is a member of a juvenile delinquent urban subculture in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and some other former Soviet republics. In the 21st century the image of "gopnik" is mostly preserved as an imitation of the stereotype, e.g., as an artistic image in Russian pop-culture and some other countries. The collective noun is gopota (Russian: гопота). Another Russian collective term for hoodlums is shpana (шпана). The subculture of gopota has its roots in working-class communities in the late Russian Empire and gradually emerged underground during the later half of the 20th century in many cities in the Soviet Union. Even before their heyday in the 1990s following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the associated rise in poverty, there was a "gopnik" culture in the Soviet Union. Young men from working class areas rebelled against neformaly (non-conformists) and harassed the lovers of Western music, which had become popular in the Soviet Union in the 1980s.