гопник (gopnik)

What it means

1. 1.

   A young man from a rough housing estate who hangs around in a tracksuit, squats on his heels and asks passers-by for a cigarette in a way that is not really a question.

2. 2.

   A class insult as much as a description, and the most internationally recognised Russian social type — though the meme abroad has flattened it into a costume, while in Russia it still names someone you would cross the road to avoid.

Examples with translations

• Во дворе гопники сидят, не ходи там.

  There's a pack of lads hanging about in the yard — don't go that way.

• Оделся как гопник на дискотеку.

  He's dressed like an estate kid off to a club.

Where it comes from

Most convincingly from the post-revolutionary Petrograd ГОП, a hostel for the homeless, whose residents gave the word; the derivation from the verb гопать is secondary. The tracksuit association is 1990s and has nothing to do with the origin.

First attested: 1920s, current sense from the 1980s

Other forms

Romanised as:

gopnik