Nostalgia

In his comment of the conference, David Lowenthal defined nostalgia as a longing for longing, for both retrospective and future longing. For Lowenthal, the nostalgia boom since the 1970s is rooted in the experience of the destructions of the Second World War and the Holocaust, rapid social and cultu...

Nostalgia is not only triggered by old photographs but also by objects, the material remains of the past. They formed the topic of the fifth panel. The first paper, "Mixed Feelings: Do It Yourself, Nostalgia and Social Reform in Twentieth Century Germany" by REINHILD KREIS compared the 1900s and 197...

No discussion of nostalgia can do without taking into account the media—the topic of the fourth panel. KATHARINA NIEMEYER, who recently edited a collection of essays on Media and Nostalgia, gave a paper on "Amateur Nostalgia on the Web: Remixing Vintage Media Technologies and Content". Taking her cu...

The first panel looked at nostalgia from a more theoretical point of view. In his paper "'Good Old Things': Nostalgia and the Discourse of Historical Authenticity" ACHIM SAUPE explored the relationship between nostalgia and authenticity by exploring the changing meaning and usages of the two terms i...

The second panel explored the possible political implications and triggers for nostalgia from various, differing perspectives. It was kicked of by PATRICIA LORCIN on "Memory and Nostalgia in the Post-Colonial Context". LORCIN differentiated between imperial and colonial nostalgia, the second of whic...

The conference began with a keynote by CONSTANTINE SEDIKIDES, Professor of Psychology at Southampton University, on "The Existential Gravitas of Nostalgia". SEDIKIDES began his talk by recounting, why he had started to research nostalgia. It was the overwhelmingly negative attitude towards nostalgia...

Nostalgia cannot only be found in politics, but in late twentieth century Europe became a mode to look back towards the industrial past. This was the topic of the third panel. It started with JÖRG ARNOLD's paper on "The Future that Never Came: De-Industrialisation, Nostalgia and the Politics of Temp...

ACHIM LANDWEHR's keynote "Nostalgia and the Turbulence of Time" reconstructed the history of nostalgia from the year 1688, in which the physician Johannes Hofer had coined the term. Landwehr connected the birth of nostalgia to the invention of the present in the seventeenth century, the topic of his...

Here is some recommended reading on nostalgia in preparation for tomorrow's conference. If you know any books on the topic you would like tor recommend, please leave a comment. Agacinski, Sylviane, Time Passing: Modernity and Nostalgia. Translated by Jody Gladding, New York 2003. Ankersmit, Frank R....

As we're looking forward to the start of the conference this week, we have finalised the conference programme. You can download here: Nostalgia conference—programme.

Nostalgia is often connected with objects—by looking and handling things we feel transported back to another time, we become aware of time passing and the world changing. In connection with the conference the German Historical Institute shows the exhibition ‘Things We Keep’. What do a jam pot, a fou...

We are extremely delighted that Professor David Lowenthal will take part in the conference and will give a general comment. In 1985 Lowenthal published The Past is a Foreign Country, which went on to became a classic. Currently, Lowenthal, who celebrated his 90th birthday last year, is at busily rev...

We are delighted to announce that Professor Constantine Sedikides and Professor Achim Landwehr have agreed to speak at the conference. Constantine Sedikides is Professor of Psychology at Southampton University, where he is also Director of the Center for Research on Self and Identity. He is part of...

This blog accompanies the conference "Nostalgia. Historicising the Longing for the Past" that takes place at the German Historical Institut London from 1 to 3 October 2015. In the early seventies, intellectuals and journalists became aware of a new and worrying phenomenon: nostalgia. ‘How much more...