The humanities, creative arts and the innovation agenda

Abstract

This time, the debate about the humanities is different.

This time the broad context is the relation of the humanities and creative arts to the innovation agenda and the knowledge economy. It is about the humanities and the creative arts, a crucial but little thought-through connection that is assuming centre stage for reasons that are the burden of this paper but also, and relatedly, because of the growth and integration of creative arts courses and staff into the university system over the last decade.

It’s not, then, a debate about the humanities and creative arts as the ding an sich - the imponderable thing in itself. The current debate is empirical, it’s evidence-based, and it’s about a wider set of issues about the new knowledge economy that humanists and creatives are joining, not initiating amongst ourselves.

My discussion follows these lines:
• What’s wrong with the standard innovation and R&D agendas in a knowledge-based economy?
• Why should the humanities and creative arts disciplines be in innovation and R&D agendas?
• How innovation and R&D policies are evolving that show a way ahead.