Date of Award

5-2026

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

English

Program

English (MA)

First Advisor/Chairperson

Dr. Ben Wetherbee

Abstract

What happens when we become nostalgic for experiences we never had? How do video game companies impact what we are nostalgic for? What might a fictional nostalgia look like, and how can it help us better understand the role of nostalgia in Western culture? These are the central questions that this thesis seeks to answer. As seen in the United States’ current cultural and political infatuation with the past, nostalgia has become a dominant rhetorical strategy. Nostalgia is especially prevalent in the medium of video games, where a steady stream of remakes, remasters, and rereleases attempts to repurpose the past for audiences new and old. By utilizing Will and Krista Kurlinkus’s definition of nostalgic rhetoric, as well as Maurice Charland’s concept of constitutive rhetoric, we can understand these processes as forms of identification and interpolation. The result of this is the formation of a nostalgic identity, which is rooted in the medium's longstanding attempts to appeal primarily to white cishet men.

Through an analysis of texts that engage video game nostalgia critically, such as the book Lucky Wander Boy, the game UFO 50, and Rachel Weil’s FEMICOM project, we can understand ways we might challenge this presupposed identity. In my analysis of UFO 50, I also introduce the concept of ludic nostalgia, which is a method of countering hegemony through active and critical play. The agentic properties of play allow for the creation of new and diverse nostalgic communities, which in turn makes space for more democratic futures.

Access Type

Open Access

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Hunter Bishop.pdf (30 kB)
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