alternative lifestyles
Outside mainstream norms
Alternative lifestyles are ways of living that differ from mainstream social norms—unconventional arrangements in relationships, sexuality, housing, work, or values.
The term often refers to non-traditional relationship structures like polyamory or communal living, but can extend to anything outside the expected path: They moved off-grid and embraced an alternative lifestyle.
The phrase sometimes carries dismissive undertones when used by those who consider such choices deviant.
- ecovillageIntentional sustainable residential community
- relationship anarchyRejecting inherent partner hierarchies
- bohemianismArtistic rejection of convention
- countercultureRejection of mainstream values
- polyamoryConsensual multiple romantic relationships
kibbutzim · commune · hippies · naturism · off-grid · agrarian socialism · minimalism · permaculture · vanlife · digital nomad · worker cooperatives · open relationships · chosen family · homesteading · shared resources · dropout · anarchist · fringe
- countercultureflower power, flower children, free love, hippie communes, Summer of Love
- lifestylessimple living, city life, family life, minimalism, rural life
- Nonconformistsnonconformist, rebels, rebel, misfits, misfit
alternative lifestylestraditional lifestyle
Long-established cultural practices
conformity · keeping up with the Joneses · traditionalism · heteronormativity · settling down
alternative, alternate, lifestyle, alteration, altering, unaltered, alternating, unalterable, alterable