Tyttötyötä luovasti

Toteutimme toiminnallisen opinnäytetyömme Merikasarmin nuorisotalolla. Pidimme kaksi taidepajaa 10-13 -vuotiaille tytöille. Pajojen aiheena oli " Minä nyt, minä tulevaisuudessa". Työmme tarkoituksena on toteuttaa mielekästä identiteettiä tukevaa taidetoimintaa ja arvioida tätä toteutunutta toimintaa peilaten sitä työmme teoreettiseen viitekehykseen. Työmme tarkoitus on hahmottaa lyhytkestoisen luovan toiminnan mahdollisuuksia tyttöjen identiteettityön ja voimaantumisen tukemisessa. Tavoitteenamme on myös innostaa nuorisotyön toimijoita järjestämään erityisesti tytöille suunnattua toimintaa, joka ei välttämättä vaadi suuria resursseja. Järjestämämme toiminnan taustalla vaikuttaa sosiaalipedagoginen orientaatio, jonka osa-alueista etenkin elämyspedagogiikka, voimaantuminen ja identiteettityö luovat perustan työmme teoreettiselle viitekehykselle. Lisäksi olemme ottaneet huomioon tyttötyön ja monikulttuurisen nuorisotyön periaatteita ja toimintamalleja. Taidepajojen ohjelmassa hyödynnettiin luovuuden ja itseilmaisun eri osa-alueita. Tytöt pääsivät toteuttamaan itseään tekemällä kollaaseja, maalauksia ja käsikoruja. Lisäksi taidepajat sisälsivät keskustelua, musiikkia, yhteisleikkejä ja rentoutumista. Arvioidaksemme teorian ja käytännön vuoropuhelua sekä työmme tarkoituksen ja tavoitteiden onnistumista havainnoimme toteutunutta toimintaa ja keräsimme palautetta palautelomakkeilla. Sekä oma havainnointimme että tytöiltä saatu suullinen ja kirjallinen palaute osoitti toiminnan tarpeelliseksi ja mielekkääksi. Havaitsimme, että myös lyhytkestoiselle luovaan toimintaan painottuvalle tyttötyölle on sosiaalista tilausta. Tytöt kokivat myös taidetoiminnan ohella käymämme keskustelut merkityksellisiksi. Lyhytkestoisella luovalla toiminnalla ei välttämättä pystytä saavuttamaan yhtä syvällisiä tuloksia kuin pitkäkestoisen toiminnan järjestämisellä, mutta tällaisen toiminnan avulla voidaan kuitenkin antaa työkaluja nuoren identiteetin kehittymiselle ja oman elämänhallinnan vahvistumiselle. Koemme, että vastaavanlaisen toiminnan järjestämisestä olisi jatkossakin hyötyä Merikasarmin nuorisotalolla ja myös muilla nuorisotyön tahoilla. Toivomme, että nuorisotyön pieniä resursseja osattaisiin hyödyntää tyttötyön järjestämisessä, sillä onnistunut ja tarpeeseen tuleva toiminta ei aina vaadi suurta rahallista ja ajallista panostusta.

Do economists ‘compose’ economics? A comparison of the creative processes of artists and economists

This is a draft for a chapter of the book version of my Ph.D thesis. The chapter addresses the following question: Are the creative processes of musical composers and academic economists essentially the same, or are there significant differences? The paper finds that there are deep similarities between the creative processes of theoretical economists and the creative processes of artists. The chapter builds a process oriented lifecycle account of creative activity, drawing on testimonial material from the arts and the sciences, and relates the model to the creative work of economists developing economic theory.

Review of 'Hearts and minds: Creative Australians and the environment'

Reviews the book `Hearts and Minds: Creative Australians and the Environment,' by Michael Pollak and Margaret MacNabb

A creative solution for rapid and inexpensive model-making in product design processes

Innovative Developments in Virtual and Physical Prototyping

A creative solution for rapid and inexpensive model-making in product design processes

Rapid prototyping (RP) is an approach for automatically building a physical object through solid freeform fabrication. Nowadays, RP has become a vital aspect of most product development processes, due to the significant competitive advantages it offers compared to traditional manual model making. Even in academic environments, it is important to be able to quickly create accurate physical representations of concept solutions. Some of these can be used for simple visual validation, while others can be employed for ergonomic assessment by potential users or even for physical testing. However, the cost of traditional RP methods prevents their use in most academic environments on a regular basis, and even for very preliminary prototypes in many small companies. That results in delaying the first physical prototypes to later stages, or creating very rough mock-ups which are not as useful as they could be. In this paper we propose an approach for rapid and inexpensive model-making, which was developed in an academic context, and which can be employed for a variety of objects.

How new online communication tools and the availability of content influence the audiences and the creative process

We live in a changing world. At an impressive speed, every day new technological resources appear. We increasingly use the Internet to obtain and share information, and new online communication tools are emerging. Each of them encompasses new potential and creates new audiences. In recent years, we witnessed the emergence of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other media platforms. They have provided us with an even greater interactivity between sender and receiver, as well as generated a new sense of community. At the same time we also see the availability of content like it never happened before. We are increasingly sharing texts, videos, photos, etc. This poster intends to explore the potential of using these new online communication tools in the cultural sphere to create new audiences, to develop of a new kind of community, to provide information as well as different ways of building organizations’ memory. The transience of performing arts is accompanied by the need to counter that transience by means of documentation. This desire to ‘save’ events reaches its expression with the information archive of the different production moments as well as the opportunity to record the event and present it through, for instance, digital platforms. In this poster we intend to answer the following questions: which online communication tools are being used to engage audiences in the cultural sphere (specifically between theater companies in Lisbon)? Is there a new relationship with the public? Are online communication tools creating a new kind of community? What changes are these tools introducing in the creative process? In what way the availability of content and its archive contribute to the organization memory? Among several references, we will approach the two-way communication model that James E. Grunig & Todd T. Hunt (1984) already presented and the concept of mass self-communication of Manuel Castells (2010). Castells also tells us that we have moved from traditional media to a system of communication networks. For Scott Kirsner (2010), we have entered an era of digital creativity, where artists have the tools to do what they imagined and the public no longer wants to just consume cultural goods, but instead to have a voice and participate. The creativity process is now depending on the public choice as they wander through the screen. It is the receiver who owns an object which can be exchanged. Virtual reality has encouraged the receiver to abandon its position of passive observer and to become a participant agent, which implies a challenge to organizations: inventing new forms of interfaces. Therefore, we intend to find new and effective online tools that can be used by cultural organizations; the best way to manage them; to show how organizations can create a community with the public and how the availability of online content and its archive can contribute to the organizations’ memory.

Adaption of the Creative Commons approach and the roaming concept to spatial data infrastructures (SDI)

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies

The role of objects in creative collaborations

Objects matter when professionals collaborate to create new products. Chapter 1 explains the intention of this work, to apply theories on objects in the empirical context of fashion design. Chapter 2 addresses the question of how creative professionals learn about and use strategy tools to turn their artistic fame into a commercial success. For Chapter 3 I collected ethnographic data on the development of a seasonal collection from the idea to the presentation at Fashion Week. The result is a deep insight into the collaborative processes and material objects used when a stable team of designers works with several outside experts. Chapter 4 applies the knowledge of the role of objects in fashion design gained during the ethnography in the context of online co-creation and crowd sourced fashion items. The synthesis of the empirical studies allows me to present the conceptual leap in Chapter 5. In the theoretical essay I review the findings on the role of objects in collaborations in relation to practice theory, present the new concept of the comprehensive object and conclude by stating the possibilities for future research.

Financial intermediation in a model of growth through creative destruction

This paper presents an endogenous growth model in which the research activity is financed by intermediaries that are able to reduce the incidence of researcher's moral hazard. It is shown that financial activity is growth promoting because it increases research productivity. It is also found that a subsidy to the financial sector may have larger growth effects than a direct subsidy to research. Moreover, due to the presence of moral hazard, increasing the subsidy rate to R\&D may reduce the growth rate. I show that there exists a negative relation between the financing of innovation and the process of capital accumulation. Concerning welfare, the presence of two externalities of opposite sign steaming from financial activity may cause that the no-tax equilibrium provides an inefficient level of financial services. Thus, policies oriented to balance the effects of the two externalities will be welfare improving.