The Creativity Market: Creative Writing in the 21st Century - Brossura

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1847697097 ISBN 13: 9781847697097

Casa editrice: Multilingual Matters Ltd, 2012

Riassunto

This book focuses on creative writing both as a subject in universities and beyond academia, with chapters arranged around three organising sub-themes of practice, research and pedagogy. It explores the ‘creative’ component of creative writing in the globalised marketplace, making the point that creative writing occurs in and around universities throughout the world. It examines the convergence of education, globalisation and economic discourses at the intersection of the university sector and creative industries, and foregrounds the competing interests at the core of creativity as it appears in the neo-liberal global discourse in which writers are enmeshed. The book offers case studies from the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia and Singapore that are indicative of the challenges faced by academics, postgraduate students and creative industry professionals around the world.

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Informazioni sugli autori

Dominique Hecq is Associate Professor in Writing at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia. Dominique is also Editor of Bukker Tillibul: The Online Journal of Practice-Led Research.

Dominique Hecq is Associate Professor in Writing at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia. Dominique is also Editor of Bukker Tillibul: The Online Journal of Practice-Led Research.

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The Creativity Market

Creative Writing in the 21st Century

By Dominique Hecq

Multilingual Matters

Copyright © 2012 Dominique Hecq and the authors of individual chapters
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-84769-709-7

Contents

Contributors, 
Acknowledgements, 
In Lieu of a Preface, 
Introduction, 
1 Creative Writing: The Ghost, the University and the Future Graeme Harper, 
2 Banking on Creativity: My Brilliant? Career Dominique Hecq, 
3 Creativity and the Marketplace Jen Webb, 
4 The Publishing Paradigm: Commercialism versus Creativity Jeremy Fisher, 
5 As Good As It Gets? National Research Evaluations Gerry Turcotte and Robyn Morris, 
6 Creative Writing, Neo-Liberalism and the Literary Paradigm Jeff Sparrow, 
7 Nothing is Free in this Life Antonia Pont, 
8 The Ghost in the Machine: Creative Writing and its Malcontents Phillip Edmonds, 
9 Creativity, Compromise and Waking Up with the Funding Devil Mike Harris, 
10 Entering the Fictitious: A Play in Two Acts Christopher Lappas, 
11 Using the Spectrum to Theorise Apparent Opposition in Creative Writing Doctorates Vahri McKenzie, 
12 Outlying the Point that Tips: Bridging Academia and Business Pavlina Radia, 
13 Selling It: Creative Writing and the Public Good Thom Vernon, 
14 On the Commercialisation of Creativity in the Merlion State Eric Tinsay Valles, 
Afterword: Creativity, the Market and the Globalisation Challenge Kirpal Singh, 
Index, 

CHAPTER 1

Creative Writing: The Ghost, the University and the Future

Graeme Harper

Creative Writing Today

The vast majority of creative writers today do not write or distribute their works of creative writing through what would commonly be considered avenues of the creative industries. The majority of creative writers today write beyond the realm of organised industry, their writing being outside of an economic system of direct control and exchange, and if they do distribute their works at all, they do so, today, via the internet and in a manner we might broadly call 'free'. This is not said naively, and it is not intended to suggest that economic systems don't impose more general or indirect controls. Nevertheless, in direct terms, creative writers are not required to engage with the creative industries and the choice to do so is, indeed, exactly that: a choice.

It could easily be argued that this has long been the case, with the opportunity for simply writing and printing works having long been present, even if central systems of manufacture and distribution have influenced creative writers as they have influenced other individuals. But the impact of contemporary digital technologies, which have brought about new avenues of personal and personalised exchange, have reduced distribution costs to almost nothing and increased opportunities for distribution a thousand-fold. While there have always been opportunities for the individual creative writer and exchange of works of creative writing, the contemporary world thus recognises and, indeed, encourages immediate interchange between writers, readers, other writers and the wider world.

Why, then, we might wonder, are we frequently still operating in universities, as if creative writing is aligned so closely with a centralised economic system of exchange that we have even sometimes seen the phrase 'of publishable quality' used as an assessment tool to question or confirm the quality of a piece of creative writing submitted for a course of university study? Questioning 'publishability' is absolutely not the same as questioning the quality of creative achievement itself, nor is a focus on portions of the creative industries (e.g. publishing, performance or media industries) the same as a focus on the undertaking of creative writing. Confusing the two fundamentally constitutes what Gilbert Ryle (1951) calls a 'category-mistake' – on which more, later.

Essentially, we need to consider the distinct mismatches (alternatively, misunderstandings or misalignments) that have occurred between our considerable human engagements with creativity and, specifically here, with creative writing and the ways in which creativity has been incorporated or discussed in economic and political systems. Firstly, how have we promoted and advertised human creativity? Secondly, what is the condition of creativity itself? Thirdly, how has creative writing been mapped around universities over time? Finally, on what basis is creativity and higher education currently touted and how does this relate to the current state of play with creative writing?

As it always seems useful to note in any discussion of creative writing, it must also be remarked that creative writing is first and foremost action. That is, creative writing produces completed artefacts, and physical evidence of the making of those artefacts (e.g. other artefacts in the form of drafts, emails, conversations, notes, diaries and doodles), but, most of all, creative writing involves the actions of human beings, human beings doing something – both physical and mental activities. Creative writing actions are primary; the artefacts that emerge are secondary. Creative writing is no different in this to other creative activities: human creativity generally is mostly evidenced in human action, regardless of the field of endeavour.

Hubs of Abundance and Illustriousness

Established in February 2008 by Great Britain's Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), 'Creative Britain: New Talents for the New Economy' was said to acknowledge 'the vital role that the creative industries play in the British economy' (DCMS, 2008: 1) and to highlight 'the need for the UK to invest in businesses and individuals [my emphasis] in order to ensure that the UK remains globally competitive' (DCMS, 2008: 3). Creative Britain included, in its £70.5 million strategy, 26 'agreed commitments', including 'giving all children a creative education', 'research and innovation' and 'promoting the UK as the world's creative hub' (DCMS, 2008: 76–77). But what is being promoted here by reference to the creative?

In a similar, hub-orientated vein, Dorothy Louise Mackay, in an article wonderfully entitled 'Advertising the Medieval University', quotes a 13th century circular sent out by Charles I, advertising the University of Naples. Here is an extract from that circular:

We have brought here men learned in all branches of scholarship, so that there may come to drink of this university, as from an abundant well, both young and old, the beginners and those who have attained recognition, those wishing to study the trivium and the quadrivium, canon and civil law, as well as theology. Wherefore, let them come, in so far as they are able, to this university, as [they might come] to a great feast which is ornamented by the presence of illustrious guests and which overflows with an abundance and variety of refreshing food. (Mackay, 1932: 516)

Come, the king calls, to 'feast' on this university education. 'Let them come [...] to this university [...] which overflows with an abundance and variety'. Published, as this circular was, in 1272, who would have thought that the forms of persuasion evident in it would be so familiar here in the 21st century?

There has long been a difference between advertising as 'taking or giving notice of something' and advertising as 'an institutionalised system of commercial information and persuasion', as Raymond Williams (1980: 170) once pointed out. Which, we might wonder, is this example from Charles I? Indeed, what qualities are being promoted to attract these illustrious guests?

As the Creative Britain programme was a declaration of a creative abundance and the need to support and develop such creative abundance in both British corporate bodies and individuals, so Charles I's circular was a declaration of an abundance of learnedness, in the group and in the person, and the opportunities offered to engage with such illustriousness. We are reminded by this that although the language of human communication might have changed over time, many of the human notions that inform our languages have not greatly changed. Seemingly, this can be summarised by saying 'human beings continue to be human beings', but this statement hides as much as it declares.

Essentialist thinking doesn't uncover the connections here (the philosophy, that is, that we have essential human properties, an immutable human essence); rather, the connections are uncovered by a consideration of the varied appearance of common human traits, common human interests and common human issues which underpin our history. Such things as our desire to search out and discover, our human willingness to engage in social interaction, our common human belief in forms of love, our human interest in time and place. Human notions that are either active or latent are revealed by these commonalities. In a minor contribution to such areas of human agreement, the advertising of universities, according to perceived forms or activities of eminence – such advertising appears to be something we have long actively embraced, even if today we see this embrace happening in 21st century ways, using 21st century tools and for prevailing 21st century political, economic and social reasons.

Likewise, consider a second notion (or, more accurately, a set of connected notions) that we humans have endorsed, actively or latently: that is, our communal belief in the human ability (and, often, strong desire) to be imaginative; the relationship between our human imaginations and our sense of what constitutes higher learning; and the frequency of our willingness (and, often, our considerable commitment) to advertising the wonders of the human imagination.

Finally, the ideal and the act of universities engaging with creative writing (as a human pursuit, as something to be learnt and as something to be valued and celebrated), that, too, is a notion we have long approved. While the formal presentation and development of this university engagement with creative writing might have changed over time, what lies beneath this engagement certainly has far longer historical length.

All these notions may be active or latent. In other words, while it might generally be felt that universities should openly encompass the creative, this is not necessarily manifest in all the business of all universities all the time. Similarly, while we might commonly value the imaginative, it is not necessarily the case that all aspects of our lives are considered and deployed in terms of the imaginative. We can analogically consider this in the same way we might consider the constant and significant relationship between day and night.

As many might remember personally, children are sometimes comforted with an adult observation that whatever exists in daylight remains there, benevolently, in the darkness of the night. Thus, the intention of the following traditional folk tale is not to frighten, but, in truth, to familiarise:

In a dark dark wood,
there was a dark dark path.
And up that dark dark path,
there was a dark dark house.
And in that dark dark house,
there was a dark dark stair.
And up that dark dark stair,
there was a dark dark room.
And in that dark dark room,
there was a dark dark cupboard.
And in that dark dark cupboard,
there was a dark dark box.
And in that dark dark box,
there was a ... ghost! (British Council, n.d.)

A common, yet individual, ghost, a representation of something human, yet not immediately ungraspable, often changeable, not fixed in shape or solidified into a temporal or spatial stasis that would, were it said to be so, defy its many forms. This idea of a ghost – and our general idea of a ghost – is that of 'breath' (as the word 'ghost' suggests, in its Latinate origins, and this is the usage to which I will refer here, not to some more manipulated and somewhat modern notion of a spectral entity). The purpose of this folk tale, as with the purpose of the words 'creativity' or 'creative', is to assist us in becoming directly familiar with that which is not directly accessible.

Thus, when we read of a 'Creative Britain', or of 'creative writing', of the 'creative industries' or of a 'creative university', we need not to forget that what the adjective 'creative' is pointing towards is exactly that ghost, that breath, even though the word itself is packaged as political language or as declarations of bodies corporate, as an active practical (a thing being done, or to do) or textual reference. In fact, 'creativity' is more accurately the representative of much more humanity than just these things.

Creativity in Reality

This is not to say, as the concept of the ghost might initially seem to suggest in its modern context, that creativity exists only in some place of its own, within the incorporeal mind, and that the mind is a separately functioning and separately acting entity to the body, to our material (and, indeed, commercial) world. Gilbert Ryle (1951), in The Concept of Mind, alerts us to such a suggestion being a 'category-mistake', using a poignant university example:

A foreigner visiting Oxford or Cambridge for the first time is shown a number of colleges, libraries, playing fields, museums, scientific departments and administrative offices. He then asks 'But where is the University? I have seen where the members of the Colleges live, where the Registrar works, where the scientists experiment and the rest. But I have not yet seen the University in which reside and work the members of your University.' It has then to be explained to him that the University is not another collateral institution, some ulterior counterpart to the colleges, laboratories and offices which he has seen. The University is just the way in which all that he has already seen is organized. When they are seen and when their coordination is understood, the University has been seen. (Ryle, 1951: 16)

Ryle contends that 'in opposition to this entire dogma ... the workings of a person's mind ... are not ... a second set of shadowy operations' (Ryle, 1951: 50). Similarly, creativity is not a second set of activities, understandings or operations existing only in one dimension, while another dimension continues alongside it – mind and body, as it were, or creative and non-creative or thoughts and actions. In truth, none of these dualisms are real. Actions, thoughts and results are of the same dimension, not of two or more dimensions.

Ryle suggested the dualistic dogma, with which he disagreed, should be called the 'Ghost in the Machine' (Ryle, 1951: 22). A phrase Arthur Koestler (1968) borrowed, of course, to title his book exploring what he saw as human kind's penchant for self-destruction. I suggest here that Ryle's evaluation of the ghost – which largely focuses on the insubstantial, the mysterious and unobservable – only considers the concept of the ghost in a relatively narrow, at best, early modern way. Here, however, if we consider creativity as a ghost, imbued with a representation of life, mental, physical and emotional, as a holder of physical, as well as mental and emotional activities, then we begin to understand how the concept (and the words connected to it) has been used and is being used. That's the ghost, the breath, to which I refer, which leads me to my primary suggestion:

Creativity cannot be a definition, and the creative cannot be approached successfully via any of our previous or current definitional investigations. Using a definitional approach, we have seen only partial answers to what creativity entails, from the point of view of the disciplines of psychology, textual and cultural studies, educational theory and practice, sociology, ecology and the natural sciences, business studies, philosophy and more. These have resulted, as Ryle's analysis analogically suggests to us, in a fundamental category-mistake.

While such definitional approaches are not entirely worthless, because they provide a safety blanket for contemporary understanding, they do relatively little to elaborate the truth about creativity, though they do quite a bit to fix our sense of creativity in place, according to prevailing cultural, economic or political conditions. We grasp for them when seeking to determine the difference, often between our considerations of the 'original' and the 'unoriginal', for example, and always according to current conditions. In reality, however, creativity is a representation, and creativity, in its distinct representational identity, is a repository, a container for human commonalities. These commonalities exist even if they are not visible at any one time, even if they are not observed, promoted or declared, neither ever fully visible nor ever totally separate from our physical world.

Creativity and Universities

The relationship between creativity and higher education (of which the activity of creative writing is a considerable, historical part) is not often very well-articulated in a discussion of prevailing government policies, prominent contemporary modes of persuasion about the value and importance of creativity or in attempts to define creativity by reference solely to the operations of the mind or to creativity's end results (that is, its outputs or artefacts). But we can find, in an investigation of these things, evidence of our many attempts over time to make sense of creativity. We can find evidence, too, of how we similarly associate higher learning with creative capacity – even if we have sometimes (and, certainly, in the contemporary world) used other buzzwords to mean, more or less, creative or creativity; such words as 'innovation', 'invention' and 'entrepreneurial'. These words have certainly found their way into 21st century discussions of the roles and impact of universities on societies and on individuals.

We discover, in these attempts, a sense of how languages of persuasion – whether the advertising of the artefacts and actions of human creativity or the advertising of universities – share similar (sometimes plainly false, sometimes detecting something, but unable to articulate it) notions about creativity, as well as about higher learning, simultaneously, often failing to deal with the tensions suggested by their language and lack of real engagement with the creative or with what higher understanding entails. Nevertheless, higher education's association with creativity and, in the focus here, with creative writing has been a barometer for how definitional approaches have attempted to resolve the issue of what creativity might be.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from The Creativity Market by Dominique Hecq. Copyright © 2012 Dominique Hecq and the authors of individual chapters. Excerpted by permission of Multilingual Matters.
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Dettagli dell?edizione

• Editore: Multilingual Matters Ltd
• Data di pubblicazione: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1847697097
• ISBN 13: 9781847697097
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Lingua: Inglese
• Numero di pagine: 229
• Redattore: Hecq Dominique
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile