Meanings
- uncountableA genre of speculative fiction with an emphasis on optimism, compassion, or non-violence.
From Afrofuturism to hopepunk, many continue to draw on Butler's vision of a future where Blackness and Black people not only persist, but help bring worlds into being.
2020, Jennifer Sieck, "Smithsonian's Anacostia Community Museum: Octavia E. Butler's Typewriter as Time Machine", The Washington Informer, 17 September 2020 - 23 September 2020, page 382 more examples
Hopepunk holds particular resonance to the youth of today because it touches upon how their lives "are precariously close to dystopic visions but who need to tell and hear stories of triumph in adversity, not defeat by cruelty", he added.
2019 June 9, Izzy Lyons, “BBC jumps on 'hopepunk' trend with new positive podcast for millennials who don't want 'dark' dramas”, in The TelegraphDoctor Who has always been hopepunk in spirit – it’s essentially a series about a non-violent crimefighter, after all – but its most recent series was its most hopepunk yet.
2019 June 10, Stuart Heritage, “In need of relentless optimism? The 10 best ‘hopepunk’ shows to binge now”, in The GuardianAntonyms: grimdark
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA genre of speculative fiction with an emphasis on optimism, compassion, or non-violence.
Origin
- Proto-West Germanic*tōhopōn
- Old Englishtōhopa
- Old Englishhopa
- Middle Englishhope
- Englishhope
- Englishhopepunk
From hope + -punk. Coined by Alexandra Rowland in 2017 as opposite to grimdark.
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Polish hopepunk
- hopepunkgenre
Cite this entry
hopepunk. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hopepunk
“hopepunk.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hopepunk. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “hopepunk,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hopepunk.
Source: hopepunk on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.