the.com/sentimentality

means An excessive, self-indulgent display of tenderness or nostalgia that exceeds what the situation actually warrants.

from Traces back to Latin 'sentire,' meaning simply to feel or perceive — the same root that gives us 'sense' and 'sentient.' The word 'sentimental' emerged in the 18th century as a genuinely admiring term, describing refined, tender feeling (think of Laurence Sterne's 1768 'A Sentimental Journey'). But within decades the word curdled — critics began using it to mock emotion that was performed, overwrought, or cheaply manipulative rather than sincerely felt. 'Sentimentality' crystallized that sneer into a noun: the same root that once praised feeling now names its theatrical imitation.