Research Shorts: Creativity as a transferable concept
31st January 2025
This week I’m featuring some brand new research, a recent article by Kevin Gormley at Dublin City University, Ollscoil Chathair Bhaile Átha Cliath. The work explores policy trends related to creativity in Ireland. Responding to other research which use concepts of power and discourse, and Carol Bacci’s idea of problematisation, Kevin highlights how the arrangement of policy text is always partial and never neutral.
The article explores the idea that ‘In documents that frame curricular provision, creativity invariably appears in listings of competencies or core capabilities that stretch across multiple disciplinary areas.’ He considers what creativity might mean in music education, and the many places it can be identified in literature and thinks about how these ways might be different from the more generic idea of creativity as a ‘generic capability’.
Kevin explained more:
‘This paper doesn’t argue that creativity in music education or in education more broadly should take any singular forms. For policy writers, school personnel and teacher educators, it promotes the questioning of assumptions behind policy constructions. It identifies how some creativity knowledge may be sidelined in policy, and in response, argues for practices such as critical reflection and artist-partnerships.’
The article calls for more communication between different stakeholders – and while Kevin is writing specifically about an Irish context, he raises a range of thought-provoking ideas that impact the music education ecosystem. I asked Kevin how he came to work on this project, he explained ‘I am a lecturer in music education at the Institute of Education, Dublin City University. My research broadly explores how creativity knowledge is constructed in education policy, cultural policy and in schools.’
Learn more about Kevin here and read more further below:
- Read the journal article in Arts Education Policy Review, ‘Creativity as a transferable concept in arts education curriculum: Synergies and tensions in the Irish context’
- Read his recent book on these topics and themes, Perspectives on the Place of Creativity in Education, Policy and Practice: Limitations and Open Spaces (2023, Routledge)
Interview by Dr Sarah K. Whitfield – Research Manager at Music Mark
