Etymology

beatnik

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Today it means: A person who dresses in a manner that is not socially acceptable and is supposed to reject conventional norms of thought and behavior; nonconformist in dress and behavior. Full definition →

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The story

Coined by American columnist Herb Caen in 1958. From beat (generation) + -nik (“person who exemplifies or endorses something”). Compare jazznik. The suffix, a cutesy or ironic use of the Russian suffix -ник (-nik), experienced a surge of use in English coinages for nicknames and diminutives after the 1957 Soviet launch of the Sputnik satellite.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.