Mediated Nostalgia contributes to the existing scholarship on nostalgia by offering an elaborate theoretical and richly illustrated account of an individual, narcissist version of nostalgia. . . .These case studies are familiar, and make the book very practical for lecturing and offering a deeper understanding of individualized nostalgia.

Cultural Sociology

Lizardi’s semiotic analysis of contemporary media convincingly demonstrates how clever packaging of the past encourages a melancholic stance towards various media objects. Reading this book will inevitably prompt your own consideration of what constitutes your "playlist past" while also encouraging a critical analysis of how and why that playlist was constructed.

Janelle Wilson, University of Minnesota Duluth

With thoughtful analysis and accessible scholarship, Mediated Nostalgia argues that the media love to sell us the good old days, even if those days never existed. Exploring the meanings and multiple forms of commodified media nostalgia, Lizardi effectively weaves together cultural theory with a variety of engaging examples, from the Freaks and Geeks DVD collectors’ set to reboots of slasher films like Halloween.

Matthew P. McAllister, Pennsylvania State University