Exploring Creativity
Evaluative Practices in Innovation, Design, and the Arts

Explores creativity and accompanying evaluative practices in a series of richly textured ethnographic case studies of creative industries.

Brian Moeran (Edited by), Bo T. Christensen (Edited by)

9781107033436, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 21 March 2013

330 pages, 7 b/w illus. 1 table
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.61 kg

'Here is ongoing cultural process - creativity, then scrutiny. All through inspired close-up ethnography!' Ulf Hannerz, Professor Emeritus, Department of Social Anthropology, Stockholm University

Under the guidance of Moeran and Christensen, the authors in this volume examine evaluative practices in the creative industries by exploring the processes surrounding the conception, design, manufacture, appraisal and use of creative goods. They describe the editorial choices made by different participants in a 'creative world', as they go about conceiving, composing or designing, performing or making, selling and assessing a range of cultural products. The study draws upon ethnographically rich case studies from companies as varied as Bang and Olufsen, Hugo Boss and Lonely Planet, in order to reveal the broad range of factors guiding and inhibiting creative processes. Some of these constraints are material and technical; others are social or defined by aesthetic norms. The authors explore how these various constraints affect creative work, and how ultimately they contribute to the development of creativity.

Foreword Howard S. Becker
Introduction Brian Moeran and Bo T. Christensen
1. What's the matter with Jarrettsville? Genre classification as an unstable and opportunistic construct C. Clayton Childress
2. In search of a creative concept in Hugo Boss Kasper T. Vangkilde
3. Reconceiving constraint as possibility in a music ensemble Shannon O'Donnell
4. The Ursula Faience Dinnerware Series by Royal Copenhagen Brian Moeran
5. Looking into the box: design and innovation at Bang and Olufsen Jakob Krause-Jensen
6. Creativity in the brief: travel guidebook writers and good work Ana Ala?ovska
7. Celebrity status, names and ideas in the advertising award system Timothy de Waal Malefyt
8. Evaluation in film festival prize juries Chris Mathieu and Marianne Bertelsen
9. Restaurant rankings in the culinary field Bo T. Christensen and Jesper Strandgaard Pedersen
10. Patina meets fashion: on the evaluation and devaluation of oriental carpets Fabian Faurholt Csaba and Güliz Ger
Afterword: evaluative practices in the creative industries Keith Sawyer.

Subject Areas: Organizational theory & behaviour [KJU], Sociology: work & labour [JHBL]