Mere Nostalgia: Notes on a Progressive Paratheory

The recent trend of using nostalgia as a neutral analytic device overlooks its roots in progressive ideology. Invented during the nineteenth century as an explanation for resistance to modernization, nostalgia remains a key concept in the political conflict over modernity. The concept is thus ideologically charged, representing progressive responses to the questions of whether and whose memory is a reliable basis for political action and what kinds of desires and harms are politically relevant.