Articles about ‘Entertaiment’

Entertainment is any agreeable or diverting occupation for the mind, something affording pleasure, diversion, or amusement: The daily crossword puzzle provides entertainment for many. A show put on for the enjoyment or amusement of others is an entertainment.

A man whose work it is to amuse those who attend a show is an entertainer.

The term comes from the Middle English entretenement, from the Old French entretenement. It is a composite of the prefix inter- (“between, among”) and the Latin suffix tenere (to hold inside). Hence, it originally meant ‘to maintain, support, or provide’. Later it grew to include amusement, diversion, and pleasure. Hence, the modern sense of entertainment, which requires consumer activity and involves external stimulus, offering pleasure, and audience passivity.