Worldmaking: Psychology and the Ideology of Creativity

Michael Hanchett Hanson founded and directs the Masters Concentration in Creativity and Cognition at Teachers College, Columbia University, USA. He has written about practical guidelines for creativity in education; creativity as an emerging social construction, and use of ironic thinking in creative work. Michael encourages his students to analyze the ideological functions of the concept of creativity and to participate in the ongoing construction of the concept by studying, evaluating and applying a variety of theories and practices. His pragmatic approach is informed by decades of first-hand experience in curriculum development and program evaluation for educational institutions, youth development programs, museums and corporations.

'To understand the psychology of creativity one needs to understand first the history and social contexts in which the study of creativity originated. Michael Hanchett Hanson's book offers us an invaluable, scholarly reading of creativity as a powerful ideology. As masterfully shown here, this ideology is both intelligible by yesterday's ways of worldmaking and calls for a deep reflection on the role and function of creativity for tomorrow's world-in-the-making.' - Vlad Petre Gl?veanu, Associate Professor, Aalborg University, Denmark, Editor, Europe's Journal of Psychology, author of Thinking Through Culture and Creativity: An Integrative Model 'Though creativity poses as a natural phenomenon, it has a history. In this incisive genealogy spanning psychology and education, philosophy and cultural studies Michael Hanchett Hanson reconstructs the shifting functions of this central concept. What emerges is not only the story of a concept and a discipline, but a history of ourselves.' - Chris Higgins, Associate Professor and Program Coordinator, Philosophy of Education, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Editor, Educational Theory, author of The Good Life of Teaching: An Ethics of Professional Practice 'Michael Hanchett Hanson's engaging and critical history of theories of creativity will be useful for practitioners and scholars. His focus on the ways we use theories of creativity to construct ourselves and our worlds is itself innovative, as well as pragmatic and thought-provoking.' - Mary Catherine Bateson, author of Composing a Life

• Preface: Teaching and Learning Introduction: Our Concept of Change 1. Creativity at Large: Functions and Controversies 2. Ideation: The 'Box' and Its Discontents 3. Worldmaking: Functions and Technologies of the Creative 'Box' 4. Self-Actualization: The Pursuit of Potential 5. Worldmaking: Functions and Technologies of Actualization 6. Development: Lifelong Journeys 7. Sociocultural Dynamics: Changing Worlds 8. Worldmaking: The Emerging Participatory Synthesis 9. Worldmaking 2.0: Our Evolving Ideology Final Note: 'The Year We Killed Creativity'