reminiscence

From Late Latin reminīscentiae (“remembrances”), from Latin reminīscēns, present active participle of reminīscor (“remember”); see reminiscent.

• IPA^(key): /ˌɹɛm.əˈnɪs.əns/

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -ɛns

reminiscence (countable and uncountable, plural reminiscences)

1. An act of remembering long-past experiences, especially positive or pleasant ones, often fondly.
   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

     Here was my chance. I took the old man aside, and two or three glasses of Old Crow launched him into reminiscence.

2. A mental image thus remembered.
   • 2024 September 11, Richard Brody, ““Winner” Takes Political Comedy Seriously”, in The New Yorker‎^[1], archived from the original on 20 September 2024:

     Fogel, working with a script by the journalist Kerry Howley, follows Winner from the age of nine to the aftermath of her plea, and organizes the movie around voice-over reminiscences by Reality (the character is played by Emilia Jones).

• recall
• recollection

• flashback - memory of trauma

• reminiscent
• reminiscential

• nostalgia

• “reminiscence”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “reminiscence”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.