episode

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. An incident or event that is part of a progression or a larger sequence: "South Africa may remain one of history's most tragic episodes” ( Bayard Rustin).
2. n. One of a series of related events in the course of a continuous account. See Synonyms at occurrence.
3. n. A portion of a narrative that relates an event or a series of connected events and forms a coherent story in itself; an incident: an episode in a picaresque novel.
4. n. A separate part of a serialized work, such as a novel or play.
5. n. A separate program that is part of a television or radio series.
6. n. A section of a classic Greek tragedy that occurs between two choric songs.
7. n. Music A passage between statements of a main subject or theme, as in a rondo or fugue.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A separate incident, story, or action introduced in a poem, narrative, or other writing for the purpose of giving greater variety; an incidental narrative or digression separable from the main subject, but naturally arising from it.
2. n. An incident or action standing out by itself, but more or less connected with a complete series of events: as, an episode of the war; an episode in one's life.
3. n. In music, an intermediate or digressive section of a composition, especially in a contrapuntal work, like a fugue.

Wiktionary

1. n. An incident or action standing out by itself, but more or less connected with a complete series of events.
2. n. An installment of a drama told in parts, as in a TV series.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Rhet.) A separate incident, story, or action, introduced for the purpose of giving a greater variety to the events related; an incidental narrative, or digression, separable from the main subject, but naturally arising from it.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a happening that is distinctive in a series of related events
2. n. a part of a broadcast serial
3. n. film consisting of a succession of related shots that develop a given subject in a movie
4. n. a brief section of a literary or dramatic work that forms part of a connected series