Pathways into Creative Working Lives

✍ Scribed by Stephanie Taylor (editor), Susan Luckman (editor)

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2020
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 292
• Series: Creative Working Lives
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book presents research on pathways into creative work. The promise of ‘doing what you love’ continues to attract new entrants to the cultural and creative industries. Is that promise betrayed by the realities of pathways into creative work, or does a creative identification offer new personal and professional possibilities in the precarious contexts of contemporary work and employment? Two decades into the 21^st century, aspiring creative workers undertake training and higher education courses in increasing numbers. Some attempt to convert personal enthusiasms and amateur activities into income-earning careers. To manage the uncertainties of self-employment, workers may utilise skills developed in other occupations, even developing timely new forms of collective organisation. The collection explores the experience of creative career entrants in numerous national contexts, including Australia, Belgium, China, Ireland, Italy, Finland, the Netherlands, Russia, the US and the UK. Chapters investigate the transitions of new workers and the obstacles they encounter on creative pathways.

✦ Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Contents
Notes on Contributors
1 Creative Aspiration and the Betrayal of Promise? The Experience of New Creative Workers • Stephanie Taylor and Susan Luckman
Introduction
Finding Your Own Pathway into Creative Work
The Higher Education Pathway
Where the Obstacles Arise
Informal Employment Practices
Self-Employment
Location
Identities
The Chapters in This Collection
References
Part I: Transitions and Trajectories: Entering Creative Work
2 Unexpected Enterprises: Remixing Creative Entrepreneurship • Emma Agusita and Daniel Ashton
Introduction
Creative Entrepreneurship: Higher Education and the Creative Economy
The Unexpected Enterprises Project: Examining Entrepreneurial Futures for Creative Work
Entrepreneurial Narratives
Self-promotion Activity
Spaces and Networking Activity
Business Planning Activity
Contesting and (Re)creating Creative Entrepreneurship Education
Entrepreneurial Stories as Life Stories
Self-promotion: Narratives of the Self and the World
Spaces and Networking: Reimagining Creative Collaboration
Business Planning: Failure, Shortcomings and Everyday Practice
Conclusions
References
3 Work Story: New Entrants’ Narrations of Their Aspirations and Experiences of Media Production Work • Anne O’Brien and Páraic Kerrigan
Introduction
Getting into Creative Work
Ireland as Context for Study
Methodology
Findings
Expectations and Reality
Education as Preparation—Or Not?
Work Transitions While at University
Reframing Themselves and the CCIs
Discussion
Conclusion
References
4 Creative Graduates’ Pathways in the Hybrid Cultural Economy of Contemporary Russia • Margarita Kuleva
Introduction
Literature Review
Methodology
The Hybrid Cultural Economy in Contemporary Russia
Working Conditions in the Public and Private Sectors of Russia’s Creative Economy
Career Trajectories of Russian Creative Workers
Creative Identities
Conclusion
Funding
References
5 Young Women’s Aspirations and Transitions into, through and away from Contemporary Creative Work • Kim Allen
Introduction
The Research
Encountering Creative Work: Recalibrating Aspirations
Getting in and Getting on: Negotiating Competition and Self-promotion
Abandoning Creative Aspirations (Or When Love Is Not Enough)
Conclusion
References
6 Working the Field: Career Pathways Amongst Artists and Writers in Shanghai • Xin Gu and Justin O’Connor
Introduction
Creative Work and Creative Subjectivity: Self-Estrangement
Chinese Creative Subjectivity: Between the Market and the State
From Self-Actualisation and Self-Repair to Self-Alienation
Voices of Alienation
Liang
Jun
Self-Alienation in Creative Work
Conclusion
References
7 In the Orbit of the Art Biennial: Reflecting on the Networks of Donors, Mediators, Artists and Curators • Elena Trubina
Introduction
The Art Biennials as the Main Sites of Production, Distribution and Consumption of Contemporary Art
The Ural Industrial Biennial
Mediators: Inventively Engaging the Audiences into Discussions of Contemporary Art
Conclusion
References
Part II: Reframing the Worker Experience: Concepts and Practices
8 ‘Meaning and Soul’: Co-working, Creative Career and Independent Co-work Spaces • George Morgan
Introduction
Outsourcing, Digital Labour and the New Economy
Ho Chi Minh City: OpenHub
Sydney: Commune
Reykjavik: Studio 53
Discussion
Conclusion
References
9 Expat Agencies: Expatriation and Exploitation in the Creative Industries in the UK and the Netherlands • Frederick Harry Pitts
Introduction
(Fl)expatriation and Self-Initiated Expatriation
Expat Agencies in Amsterdam: A Case Study
Conclusion
References
10 Diversity Initiatives and Addressing Inequalities in Craft • Karen Patel
Inequalities in the UK Craft Sector
Diversity Initiatives and This Research
Diversity Discourses and Addressing Inequalities in Craft
Challenges for Women Makers of Colour
Person: Online Identity and the Threat of Racism
Platform: Digital and Social Media Skills
Practice: Social Media Use in Craft Practice
Using Diversity Discourses in Research Into Creative Industries Work
Conclusion: Opportunities to Unblock Pathways Into Craft
References
11 Becoming and Being a Creative and Entrepreneurial Mum in Finland • Hanna-Mari Ikonen
Introduction
Creative Work, Mumpreneurship, and the Culture of Intensive Mothering
The Finnish Context
The Research
Pathways into Creative Entrepreneurship
Explaining the Ways of Being a Creative Entrepreneur and Mother
Conclusions
References
12 It Started with the Arts and Now It Concerns All Sectors: The Case of Smart, a Cooperative of ‘Salaried Autonomous Workers’ • Annalisa Murgia and Sarah de Heusch
Introduction
‘Collectively Individualised’: On the Increase of Fragmentation, But Also the Emerging Attempts at Collective Organisation
Research Context
Methodology
How to Bridge Autonomy and Solidarity: The Case of Smart
From Artists to Creative Workers to All Freelancers
From a Labour Market Intermediary to a ‘Quasi-union’
From Nationally to Internationally Based Projects and Networks
Conclusions: A Constantly Evolving Cooperative in a Constantly Evolving Labour Market
References
13 Reputation and Personal Branding in the Platform Economy • Alessandro Gandini and Ivana Pais
Introduction
Low-Skilled Labour: The Next Personal Branding Frontier?
Personal Branding in Platform Labour: Creating Authenticity
Platform Labour and Personal Branding: From Structure to Agency, and Back
Signalling Expertise: Peer Evaluation as a Dominant Strategy
Conclusion
References
14 Cities’ Hope Labour in Insecure Times: On Aspiring Creative Industries, Travelling Expectations and Aesthetic Pedagogies • Marguerite van den Berg
‘Personalities, Not Personnel’
Rotterdam’s Desired Economy
Imagining New Populations as Hope Labour
Travelling Expectations
Displacements and Mandatory Aesthetic ‘Participation’
Dress Advice for the Precarious Unemployed
Conclusions
References
Part III: Conclusion
15 New Pathways into Creative Work? • Stephanie Taylor and Susan Luckman
Introduction
The Conventional Pathway into Working Life
The Distinctiveness of Creative Work Experience
The Contemporary Work Experience
The Pathway of (False) Promise
A Worker’s View of the Pathway
References
Index