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Jan 20, 2011 23:19

I'm looking for a term I'm not sure exists. I'd be willing to make it up, but I'm doing a bad job.

What's the term for books that people enjoy chiefly because they've lived where the story is set? For films that are enjoyable mostly because you're already familiar with the scenery?

Lisa had to read the first Twilight book because she'd lived in ( Read more... )

coining

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Comments 11

leemoyer January 21 2011, 07:30:51 UTC
The term NOSTALGIA describes a yearning for the past, often in idealized form.[1] The word is a learned formation of a Greek compounds, consisting of νόστος, nóstos, "returning home", a Homeric word, and ἄλγος, álgos, "pain" or "ache".

Therefore, I suggest NOSPHILIA, "A love of returning home"

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robheinsoo January 24 2011, 23:46:35 UTC
Nostalgia is the right direction. A friend on Facebook mentioned Narcissus. And so the term I'm now using patches those two words together. It may not be elegant, but I like it: narcissustalgia!

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richardthinks January 21 2011, 08:04:29 UTC
leemoyer beat me to it: I was going to cite nostalgia, exactly because it's about home rather than the past, per se.

I got suckered into reading Philip Pullman's Dark Materials thing by this, because I was delighted to recognise Oxford (twice! old PP must've been feeling very nostalgic). The joke was on me because most of the rest of it is set in unconvincing manques of the arctic, Naples and Slough.

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robheinsoo January 24 2011, 23:48:19 UTC
It's perfect that a comment that begins with your nostalgia for Oxford ends by teaching me a new word: manque.

I've heard the word used. But I never really knew what it meant, and I'd never looked it up.

And on top of that you shore up my own inability to get through the Dark Materials. Yessssss.

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ext_399928 January 21 2011, 16:42:05 UTC
Homefried?

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robheinsoo January 24 2011, 23:48:59 UTC
That certainly is simpler. Oddly, home-refried might be closer to the mark!

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agrumer January 21 2011, 18:14:37 UTC
Ideally, an obvious modification of the word would then describe the opposite -- a book or a movie that one dislikes just because one is familiar with the setting and the author/filmmaker got something wrong.

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ext_400273 January 21 2011, 23:04:03 UTC
I like "nosphilia" . . . though I think you could slightly alter it to capture to blend of revulsion and pleasure by spelling it "nausphilia".

I keep trying to work in the concept of "suppression" or "tranquilization" into the title though . . . the familiar scenes are enough the suppress the revulsion and aversion we might otherwise feel.

"Geotranqing," maybe?

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robheinsoo January 24 2011, 23:49:36 UTC
Geotranqing deserves to be a word. For what I'm not certain!

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