nostalgia
noun
Example Sentences
Jackson Lears, Nation, 26 Feb. 2007 My own feelings were that since I'd jettisoned employment, marriage, nostalgia and swampy regret, I was now rightfully a man aquiver with possibility and purpose … Richard Ford, Independence Day, 1995 … the script is written in advance, around the uplifting themes of our civic religion: reconciliation, patriotism, self-sacrifice, the bond of leader and little guy, nostalgia for what is inevitably called "a simpler time." Katha Pollitt, Nation, 22 May 1995 Nevertheless, if one understands the nostalgia for war which marked these years of his break with America, it still remains a nostalgia that is empyreal and histrionic. Only once in his career did MacArthur lead as small a body of men as a company—one somehow feels that the idea of MacArthur, even as a boy, in command of anything less than a division verges on the ludicrous … William Styron, "MacArthur," 8 Oct. 1964, in This Quiet Dust and Other Writings, 1982 A wave of nostalgia swept over me when I saw my childhood home. He was filled with nostalgia for his college days. See More Amy Dickinson, cleveland, 10 Sep. 2022 Fond nostalgia for yesteryear is as good a fantasy as any. Amy Dickinson, Detroit Free Press, 10 Sep. 2022 Fond nostalgia for yesteryear is as good a fantasy as any. Amy Dickinson, Chicago Tribune, 10 Sep. 2022 Fond nostalgia for yesteryear is as good a fantasy as any. Amy Dickinson, oregonlive, 10 Sep. 2022 While nostalgia may be a factor for many, some are more recently initiated fans of frill. New York Times, 16 Aug. 2022 The nostalgia for just a few months ago is palpable. Riley Rogerson, Anchorage Daily News, 29 July 2022 At the same time, nostalgia has never been more of a force in popular culture, both before the pandemic and today. Laird Borrelli-persson, Vogue, 28 July 2022 As usual, nostalgia and anniversaries will also be a major part of this year’s convention. Brian Lowry, CNN, 21 July 2022 See More Word History
borrowed from New Latin, from Greek nóstos "return, homecoming" (nominal derivative, with o-ablaut and the suffix -to-, from the base of néomai, neîsthai "to come/go [home, back], return") + -o- -o- + -algia -algia; néomai going back to the Indo-European verbal base *nes- "escape danger, return safely," whence also Germanic *nesan- "to be saved, return safely" (whence Old English nesan, genesan "to be saved, survive" [strong verb class V], Old Saxon ginesan "to be saved, convalesce," Old High German, "to recover, be saved," Gothic ganisan "to be saved"), Sanskrit násate "approaches, resorts to someone, joins"; from a causative stem *nos-éi̯e- Germanic *nazjan-, whence Old English nerian "to save, preserve," Old Frisian nera "to save, nourish, Old Saxon nerian "to rescue, redeem, nourish," Old High German nerien, nerren "to nourish, support, save, heal," Gothic nasjan "to save, heal"; and from lengthened grade *nōzjan- Old Icelandic nœra "to refresh, nourish"
Note: The Latin word nostalgia was coined by the physician Johannes Hofer (1669-1752), a native of Mühlhausen/Mulhouse in Alsace, in his doctoral thesis Dissertatio medica de ΝΟΣΤΑΛΓΙΑ, oder Heimwehe (Basel, 1688), as a calque of the German word Heimweh. — Also assigned to the Indo-European verbal base *nes- by some are Tocharian A nasam, B nesau "(I) am," though Douglas Adams (A Dictionary of Tocharian B, Revised and Enlarged, Rodopi, 2013, s.v.) proposes a more attractive solution.
1729, in the meaning defined at sense 2
Kids Definition
nostalgia
noun
Medical Definition
nostalgia
noun