This conceptual article connects and extends understandings of television rerun programming, from both industry and audience perspectives, to identify 3 potential cultural functions of reruns: cross-generational informing when multiple generations view the same program at similar life stages; social continuity when reruns are used to cope with high degrees of social change; and collective memory when reruns repeat the shared experiences that define and identify generations and cultures. The stability offered by reruns, in effect, allows viewers to relive the past and know the future.
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