What is Creativity?

Dear Real Academics, 

What is creativity? 

In graduate school, I took a whole course on the topic, but I honestly don't think I can define "creativity" for you as I write, at this moment.

So, for today's post, I wanted to present some different definitions, share some ideas, and ask for your thoughts. Here we go!

If I search "What is creativity?" I get the following top three definitions from Google with their respective sources:

(1) "Creativity is defined as the tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives, or possibilities that may be useful in solving problems, communicating with others, and entertaining ourselves and others." http://www.csun.edu/~vcpsy00h/creativity/define.htm

(2) "Creativity is the ability to transcend traditional ways of thinking or acting, and to develop new and original ideas, methods or objects".
https://99designs.com/blog/creative-thinking/what-is-creativity/

(3) "Creativity encompasses the ability to discover new and original ideas, connections, and solutions to problems. It’s a part of our drive as humans—fostering resilience, sparking joy, and providing opportunities for self-actualization. 
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/creativity

My thoughts:
The first source is from a university site, the second from a design website, and the third is from a psychology website. Isn't that interesting?
 
The university site definition mentions generating or recognizing something useful and entertaining. 
The second definition from the design site mentions developing something novel.
The third definition from the psychology site mentions discovery as a human drive for personal enhancement. 

Now that I've thought through the definitions above, here's my attempt at defining creativity:

Creativity is the ability to develop something novel by being able to see, connect, and communicate existing ideas or things in a way different from the current trends.

In my definition, I wanted to include the ideas of creating either ideas or things. Intellectuals might create new ideas, but artists might create a new piece of artwork. I also wanted to communicate the idea of creativity as a process of seeing, connecting, and communicating. I deliberately steered away from ideas related to the purpose of creativity because the purpose could be utilitarian, but it might not be. Last, I included the idea of something different from current trends, because I am historically minded, and I think context is important. What may be creative now, may not be creative later or what may be creative later, may not be creative now.

How would you define creativity, Real Academics?

Let us know by either commenting on this post or dropping us a quick email at inforealacademics@gmail.com. 

As always, we love to hear from you!

Until next time, happy writing, productivity, and truth-seeking,

Maggie

www.therealacademics.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Need a Boost of Encouragement? The Accomplishment List

Image
Dear Real Academics, As faculty (at the time of this writing), I am on a 9 month-contract.  But, every summer for the past 7 years in my tenure-track position seems to be a non-stop list of things to do including attending dissertation defenses, reviewing manuscripts, reviewing conference proposals, going to research meetings, analyzing data, writing and submitting conference proposals, writing and submitting manuscripts and grants, setting up classes for the next semester, setting up meetings for the next semester,  answering student advising emails,  managing upcoming faculty searches, and more. So, you can imagine how annoyed I get when I hear people assume that I am so lucky to be an "educator" because I get summers off. I wish!  Around the end of July this year, I was near burn-out.  Around the first week of August , I was looking ahead to the gazillion of emails streaming into my in-box to get things set up for the start of the semester (not to mention the...
Read more

The Power of Logging

Image
Dear Real Academics, There's a pattern among productivity strategists: If you want results, track your progress. Whether I'm watching a video or reading about financial planning, nutritional well-being, exercise programs, writing productivity, or self management in general, all programs that WORK have some element of what I default to calling "logging". I default to this term because of my experience with logging with writing (more on that below). Logging is tracking your progress.  I know, I know...it sounds dull and mundane and boring and hard to remember to do. It may even sound rigid, but here's the news: It is powerful. Why? This is a good question. For this post, I will not get into any facts or figures or empirical data to prove to you that tracking your progress is powerful when it comes to making progress.  But, reflect on your own experience. When have you made real progress on any goal you had that required change/effort/difficulty? What did it look lik...
Read more

Writing Models

Image
Dear Real Academics, Did you know there's such a thing as a writing model? And, here, I don't mean a person holding up the palm of their hand under a piece of paper to display it. Here I mean an example of writing similar to the one you need to or want to (or both!) compose. When I was in graduate school, I knew I needed to write a dissertation in order to graduate. Early in my program, I had never written a dissertation, much less read one. So, I looked for dissertation models in my program and studied them -- not for the content but for the structure. I asked myself: How long are dissertations? (they vary tremendously depending on methodology, I discovered!). How are dissertations organized? (there are traditional chapters, but there are formats that include a collection of related journal articles). How does each dissertation section begin and end? (I learned they are fairly repetitive in the beginning and end of each section because they are so long and want to remind the ...
Read more