counterstream

noun

coun·​ter·​stream ˈkau̇n-tər-ˌstrēm 

variants or counter-stream

plural counterstreams or counter-streams

1

: a stream which runs counter to another

… those concealed rocks which I found when I was out in my boat; and which rocks, as they checked the violence of the stream, and made a kind of counter-stream, or eddy …

—Daniel Defoe

… there has been a counterstream of migrants returning from Britain and North America to many parts of the Caribbean …

—George Gmelch

2

: something (such as a political, cultural, or religious system) that is different from or opposed to the mainstream

… a convincing argument that the Appalachian religion is an authentic counterstream to modern, mainstream Protestantism.

—The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture

But there is a critical difference between counterstream and mainstream cultures. The counterstream cultures lived in harmony with their environment, because they either had to or they chose to.

—Majda Bastic

Word History

First Known Use

1719, in the meaning defined at sense 1