Critical creativity: melding, exploding, blending

Abstract

In this article, the authors expose, for critical review and public scrutiny, their challenge to the critical paradigm as an adequate location for the transformational practice development and research approaches that they are developing in healthcare. Whilst they accept the fundamental assumptions of the critical paradigm, in their view it does not recognise the creativity required in their approaches. Neither does it explicitly acknowledge that creativity often requires moral and sacred dimensions as people push out the boundaries of the known within their own practices. In particular, the authors expose these gaps within Fay’s eight critical theories for practice. Over the last decade, the authors have addressed these gaps by combining the assumptions of the critical paradigm with their experiences of using creative imagination and expression in their practice development (PD) and action research work. Then through a critical review of their work, they have created a new paradigmatic synthesis to add to the critical paradigm. They call this synthesis ‘critical creativity’. In this article, the authors set out their reflexive journey that has led to the articulation of ‘critical creativity’ as a paradigmatic synthesis for action‐oriented development and research.

Keywords:

• Critical Creativity
• Practice Development
• Action Research
• Reflexivity
• Critical Paradigm
• Praxis

Notes

1. We are grateful to Professor Brian Fay, who, through the process of peer review, provided us with a form of words to help articulate the central message of our article when we were struggling to do this in a way that captured the essence of our message. Professor Fay’s critique enabled us to achieve a greater theoretical clarity in our work.

2. In Fay’s (1987) original work, he used the word ‘force’ instead of power. For the purposes of this article and our understanding of critical social science in the context of the development of practice in health and social care contexts, we understand Fay to mean ‘power’ when he uses the word ‘force’.

3. The development processes were undertaken with some other members of the practice development colloquium, namely: Maeve McGinley, Liz Henderson, Carolyn Kerr and Cathy O’Connell. We wish to acknowledge their contribution to the development of our understanding of critical creativity and the articulation of key attributes and processes. We also wish to acknowledge the critique offered by other members of the colloquium.