Recognising the Nexus Between the Entertainment Industry and Nigeria’s Economic Growth

The entertainment industry in its present state, as occasioned by the new wave of technology, is a ‘cash cow’. However, most African countries, Nigeria inclusive, are not fully tapping into its great potential to generate the required revenue for their economic growth and development. Anchored on the premise of cultural history, the paper adopts the historical research method to interrogate the concept of entertainment from the pre-colonial era to its current state and find the nexus between entertainment and the economic growth of nations. It finds that the entertainment industry is a gold mine that is not fully explored and concludes that Nigeria needs to capitalise on the new forms of technological advancement that could enhance and boost her economy. It recommends that young people need to be trained and repositioned in the process of driving modern entertainment and creative industries. Future researches need to explore ways Nigerians and Africans will learn to harness and absorb the positive changes in technological advancement and the digital revolution that is fast changing the face and pace of entertainment and the creative industries. This paper was limited by the shortage of schorly documentation on the emerging Nigerian creative industries.