Dream Job or Ordinary Work

Understandings of Creativity and Work in Creative Industries

Bibliographic Data

ID7178109
AuthorsAnne O’ Brien (0000-0003-2306-1415, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, corresponding author), Anne O’brien (0000-0003-1185-1460, corresponding author), Sarah Arnold (0000-0001-9774-2550, National University of Ireland, Maynooth)
Year2025
Volume26
Issue8
Pages843-858
Publication date2025-04-23
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueTelevision & New Media (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1527-4764 • E-ISSN: 1552-8316
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/15274764251334578
OpenAlexW4409779737
LanguageEN
References cited33

This paper examines how early career workers in Irish Creative Industries perceive creativity in relation to their work experiences. Based on a survey of twenty workers in media, digital, marketing, and social media roles, the findings show workers did not claim creative identities nor see their jobs as creative. Instead they associate creative workplaces with constraints, and with quite “ordinary” and hard work. Nonetheless, they operationalized an idea of creativity and listed creative fulfilment and recognition as rewards for their work. This finding is significant because it departs from accounts of the attraction of creative work as intrinsically tied to questions of identity and rather points to an ideology of the creative as a key attractor for current new entrants, who privilege an ideal notion of creative work even despite their own material experiences that contradict that ideal

Art · Creative industries · Creative work · Creativity · Dream · Political science · Public relations · Sociology · Visual arts · Work (physics · Artistic and Creative Research · Creativity in Education and Neuroscience · Cultural Industries and Urban Development · Engineering · Psychology · Social Psychology

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