The culture of consumption

Scene ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-86
Author(s):  
Christine White

Abstract The creative and cultural arts sector in the United Kingdom, most often termed the 'arts and cultural industries' in 2011 had a turnover of £12.4 billion published in Create Arts Council England. The Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR) stated that the arts and cultural industry in 2016 was responsible for £21.2 billion direct turnover, which involved 137,250 jobs. This sector pays 5% more than the UK median salary and so makes a positive contribution to an average household. This industry also plays an important role in supporting wider commercial activity. This includes tourism spend estimated as £856 million and this includes film production advertising, design and crafts all of which is also showcased overseas. In addition, this sector's work is seen to have a wider benefit for health and wellbeing. For example, those who attended a cultural place or event in the preceding twelve months were 60% more likely to report good health and in terms of spend, people valued being in an audience for the arts as they spent £2000 a year on events, which is more than for sport, as cited in the Arts Council England report of 2014. The continued need for reports and advocacy for the value of the arts and how that value should be ascribed is frustrating as there is a continued and pervasive sense that these areas are still of less value when compared with STEM learning and industrial activity, yet there are an estimated 89,000 jobs in museums, galleries and libraries and 296,000 jobs in music, performing and visual arts. In 2018, the number of jobs in the creative industries sector stood at just over two million, an increase of 1.6% from 2017. The sector accounted for 6.2% of UK jobs in 2018. The number of jobs in the creative industries has increased by 30.6% from 2011: three times the growth rate of employment in the United Kingdom overall (10.1%) (Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport [DCMS] 2018). The cultural sector had a workforce of 659,000, a fall of 2.1% from 674,000 in 2017 (a record number). The sector accounted for 2.0% of all UK jobs in 2018. Since 2011, the cultural sector workforce has grown by 21.0%.All of these sectors do not include tourism; however, we know that when people are tourists, they are doing and seeing stuff which is most often in the realm of cultural and creative sector developed activity. Across Europe and by their different methodologies of definition of the cultural sector, defined anyone employed in an economic sector defined as 'cultural', irrespective of whether they are employed in a cultural occupation and all persons with occupations relating to culture are included, even if the people concerned are employed in non-cultural sectors ‐ the number is 8.7 million people (European Union Labour Force Survey: EU-LFS).

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hei Wan Mak ◽  
Meg Fluharty ◽  
Daisy Fancourt

ObjectivesThe global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 heavily affected the arts and creative industries due to the instigation of lockdown measures in the United Kingdom and closure of venues. However, it also provided new opportunities for arts and cultural engagement through virtual activities and streamed performances. Yet it remains unclear (i) who was likely to engage with the arts at home during lockdown, (ii) how this engagement differed from patterns of arts engagement prior to COVID-19, and (iii) whether home-based arts engagement was related to people’s ability to cope with their emotions during lockdown. This study was therefore designed to address these questions.MethodsWe used data collected in late May from the United Kingdom COVID-19 Social Study run by University College London. Multivariate regressions were used for the analysis (N = 19,384). Identified factors included demographic factors, socio-economic position, psychosocial wellbeing and health conditions, adverse events/worries, and coping styles.ResultsFour types of home-based arts engagement were identified during the COVID-19 pandemic: digital arts and writing, musical activities, crafts, and reading for pleasure. Our results show that the strongest predictors of the engagement were age, education attainment, social support, and emotion-focused or supportive coping styles. In particular, younger adults (aged 18–29), non-keyworkers, people with greater social support, people who had lost work, those who were worried about catching the virus, and those with an emotion-focused, problem-focused or supportive coping style were more likely to have increased arts engagement during lockdown. Arts activities were used as approach and avoidance strategies to help cope with emotions, as well as to help improve self-development.ConclusionOverall, our study suggests that while some people who engaged in the arts during the COVID-19 pandemic were those who typically engage under normal circumstances, the pandemic has also created new incentives and opportunities for others to engage virtually. Additionally, this study highlights the value of the arts as coping tools during stressful situations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 53S-63S
Author(s):  
Jill Sonke ◽  
Kelley Sams ◽  
Jane Morgan-Daniel ◽  
Andres Pumariega ◽  
Faryal Mallick ◽  
...  

Study Objective. Suicide is a serious health problem that is shaped by a variety of social and mental health factors. A growing body of research connects the arts to positive health outcomes; however, no previous systematic reviews have examined the use of the arts in suicide prevention and survivorship. This review examined how the arts have been used to address suicide prevention and survivorship in nonclinical settings in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. Design and Setting. Ten bibliographic databases, five research repositories, and reference sections of articles were searched to identify published studies. Articles presenting outcomes of interventions conducted between 2014 and 2019 and written in English, were included. Primary Results. Nine studies met inclusion criteria, including qualitative, quantitative randomized controlled trials, quantitative nonrandomized, quantitative descriptive, and mixed-methods studies. The programs studied used film and television (n = 3), mixed-arts (n = 3), theatre (n = 2), and quilting (n = 1). All nine interventions used the arts to elicit emotional involvement, while seven also used the arts to encourage engagement with themes of health. Study outcomes included increased self-efficacy, awareness of mental health issues, and likelihood for taking action to prevent suicide, as well as decreases in suicidal risk and self-harming behaviors. Conclusions. Factors that influence suicide risk and survivorship may be effectively addressed through arts-based interventions. While the current evidence is promising with regard to the potential for arts programs to positively affect suicide prevention and survivorship, this evidence needs to be supplemented to inform recommendations for evidence-based arts interventions.


2004 ◽  
Vol 112 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Redhead

This essay introduces two new concepts into the international debate about the theory and practice of creative industries. These concepts are ‘creative modernity’ and the ‘new cultural state’. The new cultural state has a double meaning. It refers to the new cultural condition we find ourselves in, what we call here creative modernity, and the form in which the modern state has governed, or intervened in, culture through law and other means of governance or regulation. In this process, the modern state — as it did in the United Kingdom for a while — sometimes becomes a part of the ‘cultural’ sphere through the project of creative modernity. As we see here in a rethinking of the case of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport in the British New Labour government, an experiment which is often cited approvingly in the creative industries debates around the world, creative modernity involves the social engineering of a ‘new individualism’ where citizens are remade as creative entrepreneurs. In this essay, it is argued that to move the arguments forward, the debate about creative industries should be re-situated within the wider framework of cosmopolitan sociology's analyses of modernity, the state and culture.


2022 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenn Taylor

The creative and cultural sectors in the United Kingdom largely exclude the working classes. Even the small number of working-class people who do ‘make it’ into these sectors often find themselves and their work badly treated by those who hold the real power. This article explores some of the experiences of working-class artists navigating the cultural sector and how exclusion, prejudice and precarity impacted and continue to impact them. It takes as its focus the filmmaker Alan Clarke and the playwright Andrea Dunbar, who were at the height of their success in the 1980s. It also considers the writers Darren McGarvey and Nathalie Olah, whose work has achieved prominence in recent years. It is through this focus I hope to demonstrate the long continuum of challenges for working-class creatives. This article also considers how, on the occasions when they are allowed the space they deserve, working-class artists have created powerful shifts in cultural production. Finally, it details some of the changes needed for working-class people to be able to take their rightful place in contributing to cultural life and the societal risks involved if they are denied that place.


1995 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 208-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leslie J. Francis ◽  
Mandy Robbins

A detailed questionnaire was mailed to all institutions involved in the initial training of Christian ministers of religion within the United Kingdom. The 95 completed replies represent an 85% response rate. The data suggest that, although few full-time ministry educators possess a recognized qualification in psychology, the climate is generally favorable to psychology within programs of initial ministry training. The data also distinguish between four different levels on which psychology may contribute to such programs: areas given high priority in initial ministry training and in which psychology is already perceived as making an important contribution; areas given middle ranking priority and in which psychology is perceived as making an important contribution; areas to which psychology is seen as making a very positive contribution but which are perceived as being of little importance in initial ministry training; and areas given high priority but in which psychology is perceived as having little to offer. Suggestions are offered for the promotion of psychology on these different levels.


2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 272-283
Author(s):  
Rachel Delta Higdon ◽  
Kate Chapman

This article focuses specifically on drama and theatre higher education (HE) programmes and preparation for potential graduate work. The article investigates working in the creative industries and in the performing arts (particularly within acting) and how HE students in the United Kingdom prepare for this life. The growth of the creative industries and successful applied drama in the public and private sectors has also brought business interest in how drama and theatre processes can benefit other workplaces, outside of the creative arts. The article addresses current policy, initiatives and partnerships to broaden inclusion and access to creative work. The research explores drama undergraduate degrees and the university’s role in supporting a successful transition from HE to graduate work. Students perceive the university world as safe and the graduate world as precarious and unsafe. The research findings have resonance with other undergraduate degrees, outside of the arts and the role the university plays in student transitions from the university to the graduate environment.


1950 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 267-269
Author(s):  
W. E. Williams

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-115
Author(s):  
Oleksandr Nosyriev ◽  
Tetiana Bukina

The article considers the issues of changing accents and cultural transformation in Ukraine, Great Britain and other European countries. In recent years, Ukraine has seen an active revival in the cultural sphere. From publishing to music, from film production to theater, from fashion to curatorial exhibitions – the Ukrainian cultural environment has become bold, diverse and large-scale. Euromaidan has given impetus to a powerful wave of cultural activism: from discussion platforms to spontaneous exhibitions, from urban regeneration projects to volunteer groups seeking to protect dilapidated national heritage sites. The impetus for it was the dynamism of the Ukrainian creative community. And further development became possible thanks to the support of new state cultural institutions. These institutes emerged after Euromaidan, such as the Ukrainian Cultural Foundation, the Ukrainian Book Institute, and the Ukrainian Institute. Institutions with a long history, such as the State Agency of Ukraine for Cinema, have strengthened their positions. The creation of these new institutions marked the departure from the post-Soviet system of cultural management. And the transition to a consistent and comprehensive cultural policy. The main thing is that the creation of a new system of culture in Ukraine has helped to bridge the gap between the state and cultural activists and the creative sector. One of the most important problems of the cultural sector in Ukraine for the last 25 years is funding. This problem is also relevant for the United Kingdom. But when it comes to finding resources for artists and cultural institutions, British policy has a respectable tradition and a number of successful answers. Support for the arts by both the state and business seems to be a matter of course for the British. At the same time, the idea of the self-worth of art is also supported by the idea of its social significance, as well as the perception of art as a primary source of creativity, innovative development, creative industry. The relationship between the European Union and the society of Ukraine is already yielding some results in the context of ensuring the democratic and European development of the state. For the successful implementation of European integration in Ukraine, it is necessary to apply such mechanisms that will ensure coordinated management of social processes of the state in the direction of European integration. The main mechanism is cultural policy, which should be aimed at regulating the regulatory framework. And the application of regulations in practice. This will allow culture to take a leading position on the path to national modernization. Legislation should be a mechanism for achieving goals, and the main thing should remain that the person should be at the center of cultural policy of the state. Given the experience of the United Kingdom, the formation of Ukraine's cultural policy should be based on the idea of the all-encompassing impact of culture on modern society. Accordingly, such a policy, being aimed at the cultural sector, effectively affects all spheres of public life. Consistent support for culture at the financial and fiscal, legislative and executive, national and local levels should, above all, be based on an awareness of the value of culture. Culture enriches people's lives, changes their worldview and inspires creativity. In the social dimension, its impact has the most significant impact on education, health and cohesion.


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