nostalgia
[no-stal-juh, -jee-uh, nuh-]
- a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life, to one's home or homeland, or to one's family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time: a nostalgia for his college days.
- something that elicits or displays nostalgia.
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Origin of nostalgia
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for nostalgia
Contemporary Examples
De Robertis, an East Village mainstay, closes tomorrow—a moment for nostalgia, but also pragmatism.
In “Back Home,” Gil also revisits the nostalgia for the South explored in his Johns Hopkins thesis, “Circle of Stone.”
‘The Prince of Chocolate City’: When Gil Scott-Heron Became A Music IconMarcus Baram
November 15, 2014
Yet her work is all heart, her flights of fancy rich with nostalgia without being mawkish.
Levin rightly disparages the “nostalgia” that he says “blinds” both liberals and conservatives to this new reality.
The books are not nostalgia, and I would hate for them to be thought of as nostalgia.
Historical Examples
The universe is a God in exile who has nostalgia for himself.
Initiation into PhilosophyEmile Faguet
The feeling was not nostalgia, for that far country was no home for him now.
The Vagrant DukeGeorge Gibbs
Somehow, sitting in the dusky Tombs didn't seem to help their Nostalgia.
Ade's FablesGeorge Ade
"I will not," declared the author of Nostalgia in the Lobster.
How Doth the Simple Spelling BeeOwen Wister
Andr she considered the outcome of this feeling of nostalgia.
Famous Women: George SandBertha Thomas
nostalgia
- a yearning for the return of past circumstances, events, etc
- the evocation of this emotion, as in a book, film, etc
- longing for home or family; homesickness
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Word Origin
C18: New Latin (translation of German Heimweh homesickness), from Greek nostos a return home + -algia
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for nostalgia
n.
1770, "severe homesickness" (considered as a disease), Modern Latin (cf. French nostalgie, 1802), coined 1668 by Johannes Hofer, as a rendering of German heimweh, from Greek algos "pain, grief, distress" (see -algia) + nostos "homecoming," from PIE *nes- "to return safely home" (cf. Old Norse nest "food for a journey," Sanskrit nasate "approaches, joins," German genesen "to recover," Gothic ganisan "to heal," Old English genesen "to recover"). Transferred sense (the main modern one) of "wistful yearning for the past" first recorded 1920.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
nostalgia
(nŏ-stăl′jə, nə-)- A bittersweet longing for things, persons, or situations of the past.
- The condition of being homesick; homesickness.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.