Entertaiment is any activity that holds an audience’s interest and attention. It can be anything from a private evening of theater, music, or dance for two to a global event with thousands of attendees. Entertainment evolves and is often adapted to different media and audiences, yet familiar forms have maintained their stability over time. The word entertainment derives from the Medieval Latin intertenere, a reworking of the Latin prefix inter, meaning “inside,” and the Latin suffix tenere, which means to hold or keep up. The root of the word tenere is also the Indo-European ten, which means “stretch.”
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia entry on Entertainment.