Sentimentality

Sentimental (adj)

1. expressive of or appealing to sentiment, esp. the tender emotions and feelings, as love, pity, or nostalgia: a sentimental song.


2. pertaining to or dependent on sentiment: We kept the old photograph for purely sentimental reasons.


3. weakly emotional; mawkishly susceptible or tender: the sentimental Victorians.


4. characterized by or showing sentiment or refined feeling.

The thought of sentimentality is often a negative one...something sentimental is often something which brings back memories, starts a person reminiscing. Something passed down by a family member before they died, something given to someone by a boyfriend/girlfriend. Why is it seen as negative to remember? And does something sentimental always bring back these memories when you look at it?

Something sentimental is usually something obvious - a peice of jewellery which is always worn, a photo in a purse or wallet, a teddy which is slept with every night. It is something which everyone close to you knows about. But sometimes it isn't. Sometimes it is something private, personal which not many people know about. After speaking to people about their sentimental possessions for our project, I realised that some of the objects which were sentimental to the people close to me I didn't know about. Maybe what makes some things sentimental is the fact that only the person which it has meaning to knows about it.

Negativity and sentimentality are often linked. Something sentimental can often be given to you by someone no longer in your life, a family member or a friend. This type of object brings up memories. But these memories are not always negative. Some things may also bring up happy memories, and no sad ones. However, these memories may not always be brought up. A sentimental object which is seen every day might not immediately make you start thinking, it may be that the memories are only brought up if you start thinking about them. So is something sentimental really linked to negativity?