Chautauqua

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A movement fostering educational and cultural enrichment through community gatherings, featuring lectures, performances, and discussions aimed at lifelong learning and artistic appreciation
2. An assembly dedicated to adult education and cultural engagement, offering a variety of performances and talks in a communal setting to stimulate intellectual and artistic growth
3. A program focused on promoting intellectual and cultural development through community gatherings that include talks, performances, and collaborative learning experiences

Etymology: The movement takes its name from a place, Chautauqua Lake in western New York, and the name comes from the Erie language, an Iroquoian language once spoken around the lake's shores. The original Erie meaning of the name is not reliably recorded, so any translation offered for it is a guess. The name stuck to an educational gathering held on the lake's shore. The movement spread from that single site, so the place name became a general term for the adult-education programs that copied it. Today the word is used mainly for that movement and for the lakeside institution that still bears the name.

Synonyms: educational gathering, assembly