Creative Futures Research Articles

Creative futures for cultural heritage: a typology of creative practice in the GLAM sector – towards a creative heritage approach

ABSTRACT This article seeks to develop a non-prescriptive typology of creative practice and its role in GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums) institutions through an examination of published research. Highlighting key issues and perspectives on integration and intent in each approach it examines practice through five categories: (1) demonstration; (2) programmed performance; (3) historically informed creativity and performance; (4) institutional preservation of creativity; and, (5) creative heritage. The first four categories subsume creativity as reproduction, in the pursuit of claims to originality or use GLAM spaces as a simple stage or backdrop. Creative heritage, on the other hand, is characterised by the use of creativity as an integrated practice that intentionally produces integrated and authentic outcomes allied to the repertoire and work of GLAM institutions. We conclude with suggestions about how creative innovation offers opportunities for institutions to meet and enhance strategic priorities and overcome challenges to sustainability relative to a wider cultural economy.

Beyond the Limits of Modernity Toward Enlivening Futures of Blessed Unrest and Complex Joy

When the world is on fire - from wildfires induced by climate change to bombs fueled by fires of fear of “others” – how dare we dream of flourishing futures for all? As we reflect on the lessons of COVID19 that are indeed still unfolding, how can we spring forward into co-creative, life-affirming futures rather than bouncing back into business as usual? Confronted by apocalyptic atrocities, how can we move beyond the paralysis of [reasonable] despair into active, [unreasonable] hope? Co-creative, enlivening futures are possible, and the Routledge Handbook for Creative Futures (hereafter “Handbook”) equips us with a navigation guide to meet the polycrises of our times with grace, courage, and compassion. Tenderly curated and edited by Gabrielle Donnelly and Alfonso Montuori, the Handbook assembles over 50 diverse voices across 37 chapters to provide principles, practices and processes that enable co-creative future-shaping. The Handbook asserts that humanity can reimagine “creative futures” beyond the limits of modernity toward futures of collective flourishing through pathways of blessed unrest and complex joy. The Handbook’s voices include “a mix of Indigenous, Black, Asian, and White/Caucasian contributors, including women, men, and trans people from around the world” (2023, p. 5). These contributors ground a diverse array of visions and theories in personal stories, case studies, and pragmatic practices that help readers like me responsibly engage the tensions of these times as we dream and enact alternative, life-affirming visions together, and move from an abstract Age of Enlightenment into an embodied Era of Enlivenment.

Routledge Handbook for Creative Futures Edited by Gabrielle Donnelly and Alfonso Montuori

Here is a weighty tome, with 37 chapters from authors with many different interests and styles. It’s a book that presents a choice: either a thorough scholarly read or a treasure trove for dipping into. It’s the latter I’d recommend for an SF audience, and it’s the approach I’ll take in this review, selecting a few shiny nuggets for comment.

Medievals and Moderns in Conversation: Co-Designing Creative Futures for Underused Historic Churches in Rural Communities

For many living in rural areas, the loss of traditional community assets and increased social fragmentation are a common feature of everyday life. The empty village church is a poignant symbol of these challenges; yet, these are sites that hold considerable potential for new placemaking solutions that respond to the needs of communities today. This means looking beyond “the traditional village church” to recognise a longer history of church adaptation and resilience within the lives of communities. In this paper we ask: how can co-design, projected through a Wicked problems and Clumsy solutions lens, help imagine new futures for communities and their historic churches today? Clumsy solutions consider a plurality of different perspectives on the nature of problems and their resolution to deliver more effective solutions with broad appeal. In the search for clumsiness, we turn to ‘long history’ and ‘slow technology’ for inspiration, uncovering deeper resonance with historical communities of place and anchoring that continuity within church sites themselves. Our paper demonstrates how Wicked/Clumsy thinking can account for the challenges faced by rural communities today, bootstrap co-design activities in the development of clumsy solutions, and uncover clumsiness in long history and slow technology dimensions—together laying the foundation for new placemaking strategies.

Creative Methods for Creativity Research(ers)? Speculations

Creativity forms a part of educational curriculum and is an important element of education research. Clearly, creativity research of the past has made a great impact in the ways in which creativity has been integrated within education and educational practice. Yet how creativity has been studied and how the methodologies of these studies shape produced knowledge and impact educational practice are still rather limited and limiting. This chapter calls for methodological experimentation, various forms of performativity, and creativity in the context of research utilizing speculative wonderings. We situate our arguments in different trends in creativity research and discuss more methodologically diverse, speculative, and creative futures.

Repositioning People in Creative Futures: A Method to Create Sound Advice with Exploratory Scenarios

Foresight scenarios are not only useful presentational devices to show that many aspects of the future are open. Scenarios are means for generating advice that helps policymakers initiate actions in the present or near future that will be of long-term significance. Despite the influence that such advice may have on policy decisions, the Foresight literature has paid very little attention to the creation of policy recommendations. Though reports of scenario exercises frequently conclude with lists of recommendations that follow from the study, there is very little explication of the process whereby advice is elicited from the examination of these future scenarios. This paper addresses this gap, examining how the generation of recommendations is related to the development of scenarios within multiple future repositioning workshop settings. It focuses on the fluency and originality of these recommendations, and how this is influenced by repositioning participants in highly transformational scenarios. Repositioning is the process whereby participants are invited to imagine themselves playing roles in hypothetical future contexts, and on that basis to make decisions or devise strategies as if they actually were immersed in these circumstances. The method proposed and the findings of the case study have implications for why and how this future repositioning approach can be incorporated as a ‘key feature’ in the design of Foresight activities. The aim is also to raise awareness of the need for more exploration of Foresight recommendation methodology.

Envisioning Climate Change Adaptation Futures Using Storytelling Workshops

Engaging people in preparing for inevitable climate change may help them to improve their own safety and contribute to local and national adaptation objectives. However, existing research shows that individual engagement with adaptation is low. One contributing factor to this might be that public discourses on climate change often seems dominated by overly negative and seemingly pre-determined visions of the future. Futures thinking intends to counter this by re-presenting the future as choice contingent and inclusive of other possible and preferable outcomes. Here, we undertook storytelling workshops with participants from the West Yorkshire region of the U.K. They were asked to write fictional adaptation futures stories which: opened by detailing their imagined story world, moved to events that disrupted those worlds, provided a description of who responded and how and closed with outcomes and learnings from the experience. We found that many of the stories envisioned adaptation as a here-and-now phenomenon, and that good adaptation meant identifying and safeguarding things of most value. However, we also found notable differences as to whether the government, local community or rebel groups were imagined as leaders of the responsive actions, and as to whether good adaptation meant maintaining life as it had been before the disruptive events occurred or using the disruptive events as a catalyst for social change. We suggest that the creative futures storytelling method tested here could be gainfully applied to support adaptation planning across local, regional and national scales.

NARRATIVE FUTURING

In this paper I explore the scholarly potential of a narrative futuring methodology for writing-as-becoming within the context of the future imaginary. Through an experimental bricolage of future fiction, theoretical exploration, and personal essay, I attempt to perform a methodology that troubles temporal boundaries and allows me to write my way into the new. I situate this exploratory work within a rich heteroglossia of creative futures and speculative writing that exists both in and outside the academy and informs my narrative futuring praxis. New materialism and post humanism provide the onto-ethico-epistem-ologies for this creative inquiry in which I attempt to entangle myself with rational possibility, absurd potentiality, and poetic virtuality. The future narrative here is neither predictive nor prophetic, but rather is taken up as a mechanism for doing futures-oriented theory; this is a writing-as-reaching into thick assemblages of the not-yet and storying the productive partiality of narrative (non)representation.

Creative futures of Black (British) feminism in austerity and Brexit times

This paper will suggest that the cultural production made by Black (British) feminist millennial creative collectives during this period of austerity and Brexit is informed by the Black British archive(s) but seeks to move beyond those borders. The forms of Black cultural content emerging from these collectives offer clues as to what the future of creative Black British culture may become.

Putting Country back together: a conversation about collaboration and Aboriginal fire management

The following is an edited transcript of a panel conversation on ‘creative futures and faultlines to collaboration’ held at the Refiguring the Postcolonial for Pecarious Times symposium in Septembe...

A Transformation Journey to Creative and Alternative Planetary Futures

A Transformation Journey to Creative and Alternative Planetary Futures

Creative futures: students of audiovisual communication in the design of television contents

Creative futures: students of audiovisual communication in the design of television contents

Creative futures: students of audiovisual communication in the design of television contents

Existen numerosos estudios que profundizan en el tipo de consumo de medios que hacen los jovenes, cuya relacion con la tecnologia es habitual desde su infancia, asi como el tiempo que dedican a ver television en los distintos terminales disponibles en la actualidad; sin embargo, sus preferencias a la hora de disenar formatos para television estan menos definidas. El objetivo principal de la presente investigacion es determinar las tendencias de los y las estudiantes de Comunicacion Audiovisual ante el proceso de creacion de un formato de television, asi como las innovaciones que podrian ofrecer en relacion al uso de nuevas tecnologias en contenidos televisivos, teniendo en cuenta que los medios de comunicacion, en general, y el campo concreto de la television, serian sus futuras areas de trabajo. Para ello se realizo una experiencia con 688 alumnos y alumnas de la universidad Rey Juan Carlos de Madrid, organizados libremente en grupos de trabajo a lo largo de dos cursos lectivos, que dio como resultado la obtencion de 123 formatos. Los resultados pusieron de manifiesto que estos jovenes universitarios, lejos de ofrecer formatos novedosos que integren tecnologia digital y nuevas pantallas, se ven influidos por lo que consideran formatos de exito de la television actual, lo que debe llevarnos a una discusion mas amplia sobre la creatividad en el entorno universitario y a cuestionarnos la formacion en el mundo academico.

From Reluctant Online Contributor to Mentor: Facilitating Student Peer-to-Peer Mentoring Online

From Reluctant Online Contributor to Mentor: Facilitating Student Peer-to-Peer Mentoring Online

Using singing to nurture children's hearing? A pilot study

This article reports a pilot study of the potential benefits of a sustained programme of singing activities on the musical behaviours and hearing acuity of young children with hearing impairment (HI). Twenty-nine children (n=12 HI and n=17 NH) aged between 5 and 7 years from an inner-city primary school in London participated, following appropriate ethical approval. The predominantly classroom-based programme was designed by colleagues from the UCL Institute of Education and UCL Ear Institute in collaboration with a multi-arts charity Creative Futures and delivered by an experienced early years music specialist weekly across two school terms. There was a particular emphasis on building a repertoire of simple songs with actions and allied vocal exploration. Musical learning was also supported by activities that drew on visual imagery for sound and that included simple notation and physical gesture. An overall impact assessment of the pilot programme embraced pre- and post-intervention measures of pitch discrimination, speech perception in noise and singing competency. Subsequent statistical data analyses suggest that the programme had a positive impact on participant children’s singing range, particularly (but not only) for HI children with hearing aids, and also in their singing skills. HI children’s pitch perception also improved measurably over time. Findings imply that all children, including those with HI, can benefit from regular and sustained access to age-appropriate musical activities.

Curation on Campus: An Exhibition Curatorial Experiment for Creative Industries Students

Curation on Campus: An Exhibition Curatorial Experiment for Creative Industries Students

Analysis of reasons and countermeasures for the necessity of alternative futures discourses in South Korea

This paper examines an overview of the Western origins and concepts of alternative futures to address the ‘alternatives to what’ question, and to define three approaches to clarify the concept of alternative futures. An integrated approach, as a holistic means, should be considered as incorporating both the formal approach and the content-based approach. Moreover, this paper presents the necessary reasons for alternative futures discourses in Korea and proposes several countermeasures to improve Korea's futures practice. To date the Korean society and its futures practices have been dominated by five tendencies: (a) a dominant modernization paradigm, (b) a prevailing unipolar worldview, (c) an uncertainty avoidant culture, (d) poor methodological practice, and (e) Westernization of the Korean futures studies. These current tendencies and their ensuing negative effects have undermined both the continuation of creative futures and the Korean way of seeing the future. Thus, Korea's futures practice has experienced a lack of alternative futures approaches as well as a kind of identity crisis. In order to respond to those problems and create rigorous products of future practice, it is crucial for Korea's futures community to concentrate on the five alternative tendencies: (a) inventing Korean models in a viable utopia, (b) adopting a liberal cosmopolitan worldview, (c) building an uncertainty tolerant culture, (d) overcoming methodological challenges and (e) moving toward indigenous futures studies. In particular, indigenous futures studies can provide the grounds for relevant and enriched futures studies as well as the development of universal futures studies.

A formal approach for designing creative futures based on C‐K theory

PurposeDespite an increasingly explicit professional nature, the futures studies field has suffered an increasing constraining to a collection of specific techniques. The purpose of this paper is to harness the foundational shortcomings of current futures studies methods, namely the lack of a well‐defined underpinning theory and of rigorous, rational, systematic, repeatable, traceable, documentable, and transferable method. It proposes a rigorous theory for futures studies whereby futures can be logically designed.Design/methodology/approachThis paper envisages the futures design activity as an extension and a generalization of decision theories and problem solving. The process is made comprehensible and interpretable thanks to a co‐generation referencing between two spaces named Concepts and Knowledge. It works by undertaking a formal mathematical approach on undecidable root concepts, bearing no logical status, by logically expanding them until a validable proposition in the knowledge space is reached. The paper is based on the concept‐knowledge theory (C‐K theory) from Ecole des Mines ParisTech, explains why it is needed, illustrates it and uses it on two illustrative futures studies examples.FindingsThe proposed research opens a new method for designing futures based on the C‐K theory that has the intrinsic capacity of constructing radical innovations for futures scenarios. While setting clear departure from, for example, brainstorming techniques or Delphi‐based methods, it offers a systematic method for designing futures that rests upon solid theoretical foundation that explains the nonsense or contradictions in producing futures.Research limitations/implicationsWhile the C‐K theory is fully supported by a scientific basis founded on mathematics and is in widening use in domain‐specific industrial sectors at large, it is still being expanded both theoretically and epistemologically. The theory is not aimed at choosing or formulating suitable or appropriate root concepts, this being the role of domain professionals. Its implementation, however coherent, is only as extensive and covering the problematic at hand as the implementers are congruous to the application domain.Practical implicationsThe proposed research can help futurists to develop new breakthrough plans, solutions and alternatives with essential and novel benefits: to help control the rationale of a futures scenario development, to control the degree of innovation (e.g. change, reform, progress, create …) to reach, and to bring to decision makers and policy‐makers the traced explanation of different design paths.Social implicationsThe benefits of the C‐K approach are detailed and elements founding further theoretical research are provided, including possible developments of C‐K theory specifically helpful for futurists. The research offers a collective design method for revisiting futures sciences by defining, understanding and developing creative futures alternatives that can collectively mobilize stakeholders. Workshops with stakeholders remain necessary, with experienced coaches catalyzing its field implementation.Originality/valueThe paper pushes the edge of the discussion on philosophical, ontological and epistemological grounds and supplies a theoretical underpinning for futures studies at large. The research is inherited from the creative power of modern mathematics as developed and proven by the C‐K theory, a powerful approach for discussing design phenomena. The author argues that it constitutes a suitable and useful asset for futures scientists insofar as to imagine, understand, develop, manipulate, and assess creative futures alternatives. The paper introduces and discusses the notion of futuron, which can be seen as a “logical quantum particle of future”.

Designing Futures: A Model for Innovation, Growth and Sustainability of the Craft and Design Industry

An industry development program, Designing Futures, has engaged design practitioners in new development approaches to evolve their work and advance the craft and design sector over a decade. This paper describes the context, development and evolution of a cluster-led model, the Designing Futures Cluster Program, aimed at building capacity in the craft and design field inWestern Australia. Through a framework encouraging groups of practitioners to collaborate, it provides design, production, management and marketing mentoring and assistance. The Cluster Program is set in the context of the cultural and socio-economic contribution that creative industries can make to communities, and the impacts of policy and funding on fostering creative futures. Case study and action research methodologies were combined for the research, which resulted in a model. Using the results a comprehensive ‘manual’ was developed to articulate the model and guide future delivery of the program. The case study illustrates how cluster development enables increased productivity within creative practice, by mentoring and fostering links and professional networks with a range of industry representatives. The model, which has been proven to accelerate learning and professional growth of participants, is being explored for wider application.

Transdisciplinarity for creative futures: what barriers and opportunities?

The call to ‘creativity’ has become increasingly familiar as a catch‐phrase of higher education policy. Much current academic and policy discussion, however, is based on assertions of the importance of ‘more creativity’ without any clear sense of what the implications are for the disciplinary cultures that organise knowledge work within universities. This paper explores ways that transdisciplinarity can assist in making creativity more evident in the teaching and research activities of universities. It draws on transdisciplinary activity in the Creative Industries Faculty of one Australian university to explore this issue. The argument put here is that a transdisciplinary knowledge environment has a greater capacity to inform creative work futures. Such an environment is not so easily created in practice, as the paper demonstrates by elaborating lessons learnt from a transdisciplinary re‐structure within the authors’ own university context.