Creative Practice and Doctoral Education

Introduction

Doctoral provision is changing with increasing calls for interdisciplinarity (Rashid 2021), greater provision for employability and impact (Picard & McCulloch 2019), and doctoral writing reimagined (Badenhorst et al, 2021). Yet limited literature exists on how creative practice is influencing this changing doctoral landscape. 

Whether categorised as artistic research, practice-based, practice-led, practice-as-research, or practice research, creative practice as part of the generation and articulation of knowledge produced through doctoral study now has several decades of history.

Research and literature to date has primarily focused on the identity challenges and experiences of creative practitioners as doctoral candidates, illustrating models and examples of practice research to argue for acceptance and equivalence, or on how existing doctoral education practices such as supervision, research seminars, and examination processes have been applied to supporting practice research within creative disciplines.

The special issue will consider instead the impact of creative forms of knowledge generation and articulation on doctoral education more broadly and in relation to policy, process, and practice. The growing influence of creative practice can be discerned in the celebrated exemplars of alternative format theses that are found outside of traditionally creative disciplines – Sousanis’s comic book format for his Doctorate in Education (2014), Carson’s rap album for a Rhetorics, Communication and Information Design PhD (2017) and Williams’ multi-media podcast for an English PhD (2019).

Concurrently, there has been the increasing recognition and adoption of creative methods of gathering and presenting research data, particularly in participatory research across several social science and humanities disciplines, accompanied by supporting methods handbooks and literature. 

Collectively the selected papers in this special issue will demonstrate and critique the influence of creative practice on doctoral education. Bringing together the often-separate discourses on practice research and creative methods, it will explore the impact of the models and methods of creative practice beyond disciplines traditionally viewed as creative, identifying how doctoral education is responding to creative practice through institutional systems and structures.

What challenges remain, and importantly, how might the potential for further change in response to creative practice benefit a broader reconceptualization of contemporary doctoral education?

List of Topic Areas

• Reconceptualization of doctoral progression and monitoring processes to accommodate non-linear, emergent, and speculative forms of knowledge generation common in creative practice.
• Support for interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary supervision and examination of projects involving creative practice.
• Developing systems and solutions for repositories and archiving of alternative format doctoral submissions. 
• The spread and influence of creative methods and creative practice research across other disciplines.
• Support for creative practitioners' routes into doctoral study and challenges around the recognition of appropriate indicators of preparedness and professional skills for creative practice at doctoral level.

Submissions Information

Submissions are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts. Registration and access on ScholarOne. Click here to submit!

Author guidelines must be strictly followed. Please see the Author Guidelines tab on the journal’s homepage.
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Authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue title at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to "Please select the issue you are submitting to". 

Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration for publication anywhere else, while under review for this journal.

Guest Editor

Dr Sian Vaughan, Birmingham City University, United Kingdom, [email protected]

Dr Jacqueline Taylor, Birmingham City University, United Kingdom, [email protected]

Abstracts

Prior to submission, please submit an abstract of 300-400 words (plus key references), including the following:

• General description of research questions, objectives and theoretical framework
• Methods/methodology/approach/mode of inquiry
• Links to special issue theme

Key Deadlines

Call for Abstracts open now!

Closing date for abstract submission: 30th of September, 2023

Email for submissions: [email protected]

Opening date for manuscripts submissions: 30th of September, 2023

Closing date for manuscripts submission: 31st of January, 2024