Everyday Creativity

"The exact question of what is creativity is often ignored or answered in too many different ways. For example, Plucker, Beghetto, and Dow (2004) selected 90 different articles with the word "Creativity" in the titles (60 from the two top creativity journals, and 30 from peer-reviewed business, education, and psychology journals). Of these papers, only 38% explicitly defined what creativity was. Further, basic questions about creativity's nature remain under debate." (Kauffman, 2009)

Why is it so difficult to pinpoint what creativity is? What it means? How have we been using it our whole lives without having any real clear parameters of what it means to be, to have, or to experience creativity? And can having a better grasp of those answers help us to identify more personally with our own relationship to being creative?

I really appreciate the breakdown of this concept that we've seen in this week's readings, lending us the idea of the four C's of creativity. I'd like to discuss that at some length now, what they are and how I relate to them, and then I'd like to share the "fun" part of class... In which we played games together.

The Four C’s of Creativity

1. Mini-C
    Mini-C creativity can speak to both the personal and subjective insights a person gains during the learning or creation processes. Kaufman’s Beyond Big and Little suggests that this sort of creativity can often be overlooked because it isn't usually groundbreaking or even publicly recognized. It is, however, extremely important for personal development because it shows a person's unique understanding, interpretation, and creative/learning processes. Richards and Runco’s Everyday Creativity also seems to support this idea, discussing how "everyday" acts of creativity—including problem-solving— may fall into this category, contributing to aspects of our cognitive flexibility as well as our personal growth. We talked about ideas like bread making and I think that likely falls into this category or the next because it's something many of us do without considering it as being a creative endeavor.

2. Little-C Creativity
    Little-C creativity holds our creative problem-solving and sense of innovation in our daily lives, without the need or even necessarily the want for expert-level achievement. This sort of creativity is important for our ability to embrace necessary adaptation and normal, everyday challenges, coming into agreement with Richards and Runco’s s that statement that creativity does not need to be confined to artistic or scientific creation but is a valid and important factor in our ordinary experiences. Zhang’s piece on neurocognitive mechanisms of di/convergent thinking seems to suggest that little-C creativity engages with both processes—divergent thinking would be good for generating ideas and convergent thinking for better refining them—showing clearly how the brain integrates creativity into problem-solving very regularly. I might identify with this when I knit, paint, or garden. They are ideas that, to me, seem creative, but they would not register as life or game-changing at any level.

3. Pro-C Creativity
    Pro-C creativity is where we begin to get into professional-level creation which often will require years of practice and experience to achieve. Kaufman tells us that Pro-C is different from Big-C because it doesn't necessarily lead to any kind of world-changing innovations. It does still represent significant accomplishments within a field or fields, however. This idea seems to match well with Zhang’s thought of neurocognitive mechanisms, as Pro-C creativity needs us to engage in an interplay between divergent and convergent thinking. This is where we get into something that leads to money but, again, not to anything that would change the field or the world. In my instance, I work as a curator, and there is definitely creation in what I do, but I can't see anything I, personally, do as changing the field.

4. Big-C Creativity
    Big-C creativity is where we find the idea of groundbreaking, paradigm-shifting contributions that can often change fields of study, industries, or even whole societies. Kaufman talks about this as being the absolute highest level of creative achievement. It is often thought of in association with great, well-known historical characters such as Einstein, Edison, or Picasso. This sort of creativity requires more than just expertise. These people had a unique vision and had the ability to challenge existing norms within their societies.- Brave stuff! Zhang’s research suggests that Big-C creativity is marked by exceptional cognitive flexibility and advanced neurocognitive processes that enable the generation of revolutionary ideas. This is where we see creativity leading to changes in the field, in the society, or even in the world as we understand it. 

The way that we worked together this last week to grasp these concepts in a deeper way was really very fun... Not unexpected from a class called "Explorations in Creativity," I suppose, but I think we all welcome the fun each week.

The idea behind the first two games was to come up with as many answers to a problem as we could, no matter how ridiculous they might become. - It was the quantity of answers, not quality. 

The first scenario we were given was that we were about to go on to do a Ted Talk and we realized our zip was broken... in the down position. Then, we were asked to provide the most ridiculous or surprising-to-us answers that we had come up with. A few favorites that stood out to me were to keep your back to the audience/camera, to try to borrow someone else's pants, to forgo pants altogether, and to have a freak out (on purpose, staged) and run out of the room. 

I can't speak for anyone else, but I found that in the first go, I was less willing to list ideas that I thought were ridiculous. - But as we talked about our answers, I felt like we achieved a different level of comfort with one another. 

Our second go was a little better, I think. This time, we were asked to consider that we had an acquaintance who was horribly distracting in class and even showed up at our dorm.- What do we do, for the sake of our grades? I honestly found this one more difficult and have to admit surprise at the number of classmates who would have done this fellow a harm. Answers included moving away, pretending not to speak English, telling him the truth no matter how hurtful, and, apparently, offing him.

The point was... how creative could we get if pressed beyond rationality? 

Our third exercise was to get together in small groups and come up with at least one hundred uses for a paper clip. - First group gets a million bucks. (Still waiting on the transfer.) In the end, we all got to share some of our answers. They included tiny icepick (for a tiny lobotomy), actual mayonnaise, and tools for stabbing, branding, and more. In this instance, very few people seemed to select the most obvious answer: paperclip.

It could be a paperclip.

Did we slip into silliness too far? Maybe. But what is too far? I mean, if we're talking about creativity....