American Krogan

ENTERTAIN: inter + tenere (to hold within)

"Entertainment" used to be in sync with our folkish and local communal notion of spiritual and social guidance. Today it is almost completely desynced from this. Now, it seems that we think of it mostly as "providing amusement or enjoyment." But before the modern world, "entertainment" took the form of ancient parables, folk tales or histories that were unique to a localized people and imbued in those people lessons about life. They taught us which morals, values and insights would help us within the world we found ourselves. They taught us useful boundaries and rules. Sure, there often was a sense of "diversion," the aim being to temporarily "divert" one's attention from the troubles, ailments or problems of the world, but even this sense served a purpose. Just as the body needs a break from work to heal and recuperate, so does the mind, and "diversion tales" performed this task in the context that life offered psychological stress and challenges for us to overcome.

"Entertainment" wasn't what it is today. It wasn't a vacuous series of haphazardly assembled pieces of psychological stimuli meant to temporarily occupy your head. Nor was it a series of unnatural and fanciful notions that a small subset of individuals, themselves detached and out of sync with reality, felt the world should reflect. Most importantly, the institution wasn't controlled, occupied or warped by hostile and resentful outsiders whose intentions were to harm, or to redirect norms, values and morals for their own needs and interests.