industry

(ĭnˈdə-strē)

noun pl. in·dus·tries

1. Commercial production and sale of goods.
2. A specific branch of manufacture and trade: the textile industry. See Synonyms at business.
3. The sector of an economy made up of manufacturing enterprises: government regulation of industry.
4. Industrial management.
5. Energetic devotion to a task or an endeavor; diligence: demonstrated great intelligence and industry as a prosecutor.
6. Ongoing work or study associated with a specified subject or figure: the Civil War industry; the Hemingway industry.
7. Archaeology
   a. A collection of artifacts or tools made from a specified material: a Mesolithic bone industry.
   b. A standardized tradition of toolmaking associated with a specified tool or culture: a stone hand-ax industry; the Acheulian industry.

Word History: A clear indication of the way in which human effort has been harnessed as a force for the commercial production of goods and services is the change in meaning of the word industry. Coming from the Latin word industria, meaning “diligent activity directed to some purpose,” and its descendant, Old French industrie, with the senses “activity,” “ability,” and “a trade or occupation,” our word (first recorded in 1475) originally meant “skill,” “a device,” and “diligence” as well as “a trade.” Over the course of the Industrial Revolution, as more and more human effort became involved in producing goods and services for sale, the last sense of industry as well as the slightly newer sense “systematic work or habitual employment” grew in importance, to a large extent taking over the word. We can even speak now of the Shakespeare industry, rather like the garment industry.

Industry