Anonymous asked: You posted?! Does this mean you will back on regularly?
I accidentally posted that when I meant to post it to a tumblr I have been using just for classroom purposes! lol I would like to get back on regularly but I don’t know if I can devote my life back to it or not! haha
Today, while in class, I found the group had begun debating some of the most very basic premises behind the question “what is creativity?” without really even knowing it. Of course, this had stemmed from a discussion about how ‘success’ [read: grades] would be handled in a class such as ours, where creativity, exploration, and a pride in not being like ‘the other classes’ is vital.
Several phrases were tossed out that admittedly I was not too found of…
“Failure is not trying”
“Creativity is tangible”
These are two statements that I found to be particularly disturbing in a class such as this, for several reasons. I think these stood out among the rest because they are what I would call definite, or defining, statements.
Failure IS not trying. Not trying is failure. If you do not try, you have failed. If you failed, it is because you did not try.
When you break it down into its various forms it seems even more scary to me. The idea that failure is measurable, and that failure is a result of a lack of effort is not really agreeable in my mind. Now, maybe I have breeched the context of this statement slightly, however I still stand opposed to its main premises. I would instead offer this….
Failure is not learning.
If you have learned something in the process, then I do not believe you have failed. In reality I do not believe that failure really exist at all, but that is another post for another time.
Now, moving on to the idea of ‘tangible creativity’. I’ve provided a definition of tangible below…
tan·gi·ble
adjective /ˈtanjəbəl/
Perceptible by touch
- the atmosphere of neglect and abandonment was almost tangible
Clear and definite; real
the emphasis is now on tangible results
noun /ˈtanjəbəl/ tangibles, plural
A thing that is perceptible by touch
To me, this definition almost begs the question, can creativity even be tangible!? Much less, could tangibility be a requirement of creativity..
To try and require a creative act to be “Perceptible by touch, clear and definite, and real” seems almost impossible. Words like ”Real”, “Definite”, and “Clear” are not commonly associated with creativity.
I think the struggle of this class will be the fact that in reality, we are a hybrid class. A class attempting to break the barriers of normality while being restricted to certain components of such.
Currently seeing this one play out all too often..
(Source: zodiacchic, via zodiacchic)
