Creativity in America: Newsweek

The burden of Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman's cover article on "The Creativity Crisis" in the July 10, 2010 edition of Newsweek is to sounds an alarm--that American creativity may be in relative eclipse. The culprit? None are actually put on trial, but the usual suspects of video games, too much TV and the test-driven educational environment in which we live are rounded up and paraded for all to see. Though their article is helpful in highlighting this crucial issue in learning, productivity and a happy life, their description of the problem, the language used to summarize the current science and their feeble attempts at a solution show that the article is victim to the same disease which the authors bemoan. The purpose of my essay is briefly to review a few of their leading points, but then spend the bulk of my essay defining creativity by the "3 C's" of curiosity, connection and communication.

A Fourth C--Confusion

Confusion is what I feel after reading their essay. There is confusion first because of the language which they use to describe the relation of the brain's activities and creativity. They try to "simplify" the neuroscience of creativity through presenting the brain's two hemispheres, how thinking goes from one to the other, how one has to compensate for the other, etc., but one is left thinking that this tour is both inadequate and probably useless. It neither explains creativity or its lack nor does it give advice on how to maximize or use the various brain hemispheres. Then, there is confusion regarding the language used to describe the thinking process. They certainly borrow language from the "field," especially when they talk about the necessity of divergent and convergent thinking, but it is far from certain to me that these two are distinct processes, that the latter is more concerned with "focused" thinking than the former, and that the "goal" of creativity, if there is such a thing, is to move from the divergent to the convergent thinking. When you scratch beneath the surface of what they seem to be suggesting, all there is (in my judgment) is problem-solving. Creativity is reduced to the ability to suggest a number of alternatives to address a given problem and then come up with the best solution given the technology, budget and various other considerations. To give the impression, however, that creativity rests primarily in the ability to solve a problem given by someone else is to fall prey, in my judgment, to the typical Amercan practical approach to reality--that something is "creative" only if it "solves" a "problem" out there.

A New View Of Creativity

While the creative person often envisions a solution somewhere in the process of investigation, creativity really is compromised and misunderstood if we see or present it as the sequential, or even mutually-reinforcing, process and result of divergent and convergent thinking. I would propose eliminating that language completely and looking at creativity under the three heads of: (1) curiosity; (2) connection; and (3) communication.

1. Curiosity. It may have killed the cat, but it gives us life. The word "curiosity" is derived from the Latin and, rather than suggesting an aimless or air-headed asking of questions, stresses the "care" (cura) involved in a process. A curious person is "careful, studious, attentive." Indeed, that is the meaning of the Latin word and is the first definition of the term once it was brought into English in Chaucer but, as the OED tells us, this usage has become obsolete. Now we think of it almost exclusively in the "definition 5" (OED) sense of "desirous of seeing or knowing; eager to learn; inquisitive." If we combine the two, we have a careful inquisitiveness, a studious desire to see and know, an attentive eagerness to learn. Curiosity leads to deep and broad study; it leads to a desire to probe things to their roots; it leads to a dissatisfaction with "secondary" treatment of things or, more accurately, it leads to an eagerness to understand the bases upon which people make claims in a number of forums. Curiosity, then, is a radical trait. I don't know if it implicates the "left" or the "right" brain or is a "convergent" or "divergent" skill. These quoted words get in the way, actually, of describing the wonderful, beautiful, marvelous gift of curiosity.

2. Curiosity may be likened to gathering knowledge; but it also has within it a desire to assimilate, to bring together knowledge learned yesterday with knowledge gained today. In a word, curiosity leads to a desire to make connections among people and things in the world. Data might be likened to thousands of bricks lying around at the site of a future skyscraper. They are essential building blocks for the structure, but by themselves they are useful for little. Or, to change the metaphor, curiosity is our fuel, but it must be pumped through an engine in order for the vehicle to move. This "engine," so to speak, is our inclination to make connections between and among things in the world. The extent of our ability to do this is a mirror of our creativity. For example, in the last month or so I have visited China, begun a course in Tibetan language, learned much about autism in our modern world, thought through what makes a company go from "good" to "great" and placed 6th in the National Spelling Bee. All these activities, from one perspective, are discrete activities, with little relationship to each other beyond the fact that the same person was active in all. Yet, the quest of the creative person is to bring together, to take a piece of information from one source (perhaps as a "brick" to "build" a joke), and place it in another context or place. The desire to integrate or bring together the divergent strands of life's learning needs to be as strong as that of the investigative or curious seeker. You make connections; you bring electricity to the room.

3. Communication. But the task isn't complete until you seek the ways to communicate what you have learned. One who writes reads twice, according to a medieval Latin proverb. One who performs or does has thought twice. The knowledge, to truly be helpful for the person who generates and refines it, only is truly useful to the person if s/he makes an attempt to put it in a usable form. There is no assurance that anyone else in the world might find it interesting, but if the creative person has sought the knowledge, sorted it, sifted it, connected it with other discrete pieces of data from all over the world, and then communicated it, it is as if the bricks and shards lying around the construction site have become enlivened and are being formed into a stunning spectacle. Or, to use Ezekiel's stunning image, it is as if the valley of dry bones comes to life.

Conclusion

Curiosity and learning are so all-consuming that it is as if, when you are doing them, you can imagine nothing else in life as satisfying. Making good connections is so exhilarating and challenging that while you are making them, you can imagine nothing else in life as satisfying. Communication is so difficult and all-engrossing that while you are doing it, you can imagine nothing else in life as satisfying. That, friends, is the essence of creativity. Get rid of left and right, of convergent and divergent. Get on to learning, connecting, communicating. The rest is commentary.

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