Proposal Submissions

Call for Papers “Creative Communities 3: Risks & Possibilities”

This post comes to you from Cultura21

September 26th- 28th 2012 – Gold Coast, Australia

Hosted by Griffith University Centre for Cultural Research

‘Creative communities’ is a well-worn phrase conventionally equated with notions of well-being, civic participation and social inclusion. Creativity in this sense is regarded as social glue that bonds individuals together through collaboration in various forms of creative projects – be it visual art, drama, dance, theatre,music, writing or a combination of these. that bring communities together in positive and fulfilling ways.

Similarly, community connotes a wholehearted feeling, the strength of relationships in networks or inclusiveness through a sense of shared characteristics and values.

There is now a significant body of practice, policy and academically focused work that highlights the importance of the ‘creative community’ in fostering community well-being. At the same time, however, the term creative community throws up a number of questions that remain largely unaddressed in existing research, for example;

  • How does creativity actually impact community?
  • What is lost when the term ‘creative communities’ is imposed on place?
  • How are decisions on processes of inclusion / exclusion in creative practices made and who controls such decisions?
  • What happens to a creative community when access to resources that facilitate its creativity are lost or compromised and what sort of factors can contribute to this – e.g socio-economic change, civil unrest, urban redevelopment, shifts in state and government policy?

Call for Proposals

Griffith Centre for Cultural Research invites proposal submissions from scholars, artists & cultural workers, designers, urban designers, architects and policy makers interested in presenting oral papers, presentations, interactive workshops, panels or roundtable discussions on the following Conference themes;

1. Creative Communities At Risk

  • Perceptions of societal danger- Aversion and subversive behaviour
  • Individual versus collective risk and possibility between invisibility and presence
  • Laws and regulations and their impact or influence on creative communities

2. Itineraries of engagement

  • Creative Practice and cultural indicators in policy making
  • Idealization and leadership
  • Professional versus hobbyist perspectives of creative practice
  • Public events as catalysts for community
  • Observing and evaluating participation in creative engagement
  • Possibilities of participation- gatekeepers

3.Transcultural dialogues

  • Emergent global creativities
  • Community, creativity and post transnational trauma -, for example, 9/11- Bali bombing, London ‘youth’ riots, Black Friday Victorian bush fires
  • Cultural tourism /mis-tourism
  • Asia Pacific heritage ·dialogues

4. Politics of networks

  • Digital social networking (lived environments versus online/virtual)
  • Politics, kinship, and the role of communities /Creative geographies, ecologies and networks
  • Migration of skills and experience (migrants/refugees, professional arts workers, skills exchange learning, mentors and novice)
  • Flexible and local forums and networks, complexity in varied contexts
  • Hard-to-reach’ membership cohorts.

5. Diversity and inclusion: Creativity as a catalyst for reconciling difference Social Sustainability and the creative artist: socially responsible creative commitment

  • Personal Development as a liberating force: confidence building in community sub groups
  • Collaboration: reliable interdependence: links through non-political non-biased creativity
  • Transparency and ownership: who owns the project
  • Old and skilled/young and skilled: forging links and breaking down generational barriers

Proposals due 23rd June 2012 to gccr [at] griffith [dot] edu [dot] au

Please use this form to submit your application.

Applicants will be notified of the acceptance of abstracts by 20th July 2012 at the latest.

For more information, click here

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