Meaning of the word entertainment

Last Updated:
14 Apr 2023
— Updated example sentences

What do we mean by entertainment?

The act of entertaining. noun

The art or field of entertaining. noun

Something that amuses, pleases, or diverts, especially a performance or show. noun

The pleasure afforded by being entertained; amusement. noun

Maintenance; support. noun

Employment. noun

The act of furnishing accommodation, refreshment, good cheer, or diversion; that which entertains, or the act of entertaining, as by hospitality, agreeable attentions, or amusement. noun

An exhibition or a performance which affords instruction or amusement; the act of providing gratification or diversion: as, the entertainment of friends with a supper and dance; a musical or dramatic entertainment. noun

Maintenance; support; physical or mental provision; means of maintenance, or the state of being supported, as in service, under suffering, etc. noun

Mental enjoyment; instruction or amusement afforded by anything seen or heard, as a spectacle, a play, conversation or story, music or recitation. noun

Reception; treatment. noun

A holding or harboring in the mind; a taking into consideration: as, the entertainment of extravagant notions; the entertainment of a proposal. noun

Synonyms and Diversion, Recreation, etc. See pastime. noun

The act of receiving as host, or of amusing, admitting, or cherishing; hospitable reception; also, reception or treatment, in general. noun

That which entertains, or with which one is entertained noun

Hospitality; hospitable provision for the wants of a guest; especially, provision for the table; a hospitable repast; a feast; a formal or elegant meal. noun

That which engages the attention agreeably, amuses or diverts, whether in private, as by conversation, etc., or in public, by performances of some kind; amusement. noun

Admission into service; service. noun

Payment of soldiers or servants; wages. noun

An activity designed to give pleasure or relaxation to an audience, no matter whether the audience participates passively as in watching opera or a movie, or actively as in games. noun

An activity designed to give pleasure, enjoyment, diversion, amusement, or relaxation to an audience, no matter whether the audience participates passively as in watching opera or a movie, or actively as in games.

A show put on for the enjoyment or amusement of others.

Maintenance or support.

Admission into service; service.

Payment of soldiers or servants; wages.

Reception; (provision of) food to guests or travellers.

A woman who takes her clothes off on stage to music for tips; a stripper Urban Dictionary

Spending time with a person romantically who is not your boyfriend or girlfriend. Urban Dictionary

To flirt back with someone or tease them Urban Dictionary

Having a great time. not bored Urban Dictionary

Anything that causes enjoyment. Requires an audience, or there is no one to enjoy it. That which is enjoyable varies from audience to audience, so the precise definition of entertainment is a variable dependent upon the audience. Urban Dictionary

One of the ways to say sex around kids. Urban Dictionary

Literally the best album ever written by Waterparks Urban Dictionary

A personthingaction which is full of entertainment. Urban Dictionary

Someone who wants attention so they talk to many people in a relationship type of way — but all at once Urban Dictionary

When white people have company over. Urban Dictionary

English[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

• entretainment (chiefly archaic)
• intertainment (archaic)

Etymology[edit]

From Middle English entretenement (“support, maintenance”), from Old French entretenement; see entertain.

Morphologically entertain +‎ -ment

Pronunciation[edit]

• IPA^(key): /ˈɛn.tə(r)ˈteɪn.mənt/
• Rhymes: -eɪnmənt

Noun[edit]

entertainment (countable and uncountable, plural entertainments)

1. An activity designed to give pleasure, enjoyment, diversion, amusement, or relaxation to an audience, no matter whether the audience participates passively as in watching opera or a movie, or actively as in games.

   • 1957, William O. Douglas, Roth v. United States:

     The delinquents are generally the adventurous type, who have little use for reading and other non-active entertainment.

2. A show put on for the enjoyment or amusement of others.
3. (obsolete) Maintenance or support.

   • 1854?, Charles Dickens, The Seven Poor Travellers:

     «This,» said the matronly presence, ushering me into a low room on the right, «is where the Travellers sit by the fire, and cook what bits of suppers they buy with their fourpences.»
     «O! Then they have no Entertainment?» said I. For the inscription over the outer door was still running in my head, and I was mentally repeating, in a kind of tune, «Lodging, entertainment, and fourpence each.»

4. (obsolete) Admission into service; service.

   • 1601-1608, William Shakespeare, All’s Well That Ends Well:

     He must think us some band of strangers i’ the adversary’s entertainment.

5. (obsolete) Payment of soldiers or servants; wages.
   • 1612, John Davies, Discoverie of the True Causes why Ireland was never entirely subdued

     The entertainment of the general upon his first arrival was but six shillings and eight pence.

6. (obsolete) Reception; (provision of) food to guests or travellers.

   • c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iv]:

     I prithee, shepherd, if that love or gold
     Can in this desert place buy entertainment,
     Bring us where we may rest ourselves and feed.

   • 1743, Robert Drury, The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar, London, p. 61,^[1]

     Tho’ they cut [the beef] into long Pieces, (like Ropes) with the Hide; and dress’d, and eat it half-roasted according to their Custom, and gave it me in the same Manner; yet I thought this contemptible Food, and what a Beggar in England would not have touch’d, the most delicious Entertainment I ever met with.

Derived terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

Further reading[edit]

• entertainment in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• “entertainment”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• entertainment at OneLook Dictionary Search

Anagrams[edit]

• entretainment

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