Hyperreality
Etymology
Associated with French theorist Jean Baudrillard ("Simulacra and Simulation," 1981) and Italian semiotician Umberto Eco ("Travels in Hyperreality," 1986). From Greek "hyper-" ("over, beyond") plus "real," from Latin "res" ("thing"). Flagged as a late-20th-century theoretical coinage.
noun · /hy-per-ree-AL-ih-tee/
A condition in which copies, images, and simulations feel more real and more compelling than the reality they replaced.
What it names
The disorientation of a world of theme parks, filters, and reenactments — useful for describing when the map has swallowed the territory.
Example
The Instagram-perfect vacation was pure hyperreality — the couple spent the trip staging a version of it more vivid than the trip itself.
Related idea
Builds on simulacrum, the copy without an original; hyperreality is the whole environment such copies create once they outshine the real.