In Defence of Creative Arts/Industries Degrees

Regarding this forum, I wouldn't invest too much energy in trying to enlighten those who are ignorant of the creative sector and what it entails, nor the academia that precedes it. There is such a thing as adamant ignorance, mainly to justify their own area, but also because it's the internet. There's little gain in defending or justifying your chosen route. My best advice is to ignore them.

Recently on this god-forsaken land of teenage ignorance a thread I created yonks ago about transferring from one uni course to another was bumped from obscurity and transformed into a an argument as to whether creative arts (in this particular case - media/film/drama) degree's were pointless.

I just thought that seen as I'm slightly bored and that I would attempt the frivolous task of explaining to the swarming masses who populate this forum and hail from the lands of my-daddy-is-a-doctor-so-i-want-to-be-one-too and I-want-a-zonda-so-I'm-going-into-investment-banking-even-though-it-bores-the-crap-out-of-me just WHY students such as myself - who could, feasibly be taking more "traditional" subjects choose not to in favour of the creative arts.

In regards to the common argument "you'll fail at life with a Ba Art/Film/Drama/Performance/Illustration/Creative Writing/Music Tech etc. etc..." - for us artsy types success isn't measured by the amount of windows on our big posh houses or the shiny newness of our cars compared to the surrey suburbanite jones' - it's about artistic integrity and challenging our personal and collective creativity in new and exciting endeavours which may or may not be about anything other than seeing if its possible.

And for the record....yes we are aware that becoming a 'famous' actor or director or artist or writer or musician is very very very rare and SHOCKINGLY we generally aren't trying to be the next big thing - most drama students wouldn't want to be cast in hollyoaks, most fine artists would probably cringe at being likened to Emin, not all writers want to be the "next JK" and not all musicians want to be popstars.

Then there's the ye olde point made that "you don't need a degree to be an artist" or the similar "you don't need to take a creative arts degree to be an artist" - that's right, you don't, and I accept that there are very many highly successful creative types who didn't study arts at HE and now have a shiny collection of awards for their work.

But just as for every thousand successful business graduates there's only one Alan Sugar - the same goes for artists and the main reason is that we need to be around out peers, and to be made to do things we don't necessarily want to do in order to be pushed and to experience who we are as artists. If an artist is left entirely alone, not subject to intelligent, informed criticism of their work they are in grave danger of never progressing, of becoming indulgent and repetitive and ignorant. The POINT of a Ba in the creative arts is not just to bestow specialist skills but also to challenge the individuals with those skills - to ask them "what's the point in creating that?" or "do you really think that's valid?" - otherwise we'd all just be creating the same type of finger paintings in our living rooms being perplexed when no-one wanted to give us £1500 a canvas.

In the same area - I'd also like to point out that in order to gain Ba status creative arts degrees do have to be highly theoretical as well as vocational and we do have to study a heck of a lot of theory in order to pass. If you consider what art is (a big philosophical question I know, but forgive me and my broad answer for now) - i.e. a reflection of its contemporary circumstances, that means that in order to study 'arts' you also have to study history, philosophy, psychology, sociology, economics, politics, international relations, business and many many other subjects dependent on the artefacts in question. In fact pursuing the creative arts at HE in the UK is probably one of the best ways to get a thoroughly rounded education (with, admittedly the exception of most sciences - but not all, as there will always be elements of physics, chemistry, biology and especially engineering to be found in our degrees).

Another point which often comes up is that "you're buggered for grad jobs" - well actually, we aren't. The intake for the Advertising/Marketing/PR industry - ya know that multi billion pound global entity, is most certainly made up of quite a large number of creative arts graduates (I mean - where else would they find their 'creatives'?). There's also jobs in the media which are especially suited to people who've studied the industry and its history. Even in seemingly 'unrelated' areas such as banking and asset management arts graduates are actively sought - a large finance company advertises in my department (Drama - their ad's are all 'take centre stage' - and they, themselves have nothing to do with the theatre/film industry) - I'll get the name this week for those who will go "PROOF" at me - don't worry. And a girl who's graduating this year has a job lined up with the Blackhorse group. Generally arts graduates (particularly performance) have to learn exceptional communication and business skills in order to produce good work - we HAVE to be people people because the arts are so dependent on the creator-consumer relationship (and also because of the amount of time we have to spend negotiating our creative ideas). We're also highly competitive and therefore have to learn such things as persuasive techniques early on in our courses - we're taught to prepare for the "real world" and encouraged to look at the vast amount of jobs available to us.

Which brings me to my last point - the creative industries is one of the fastest growing sectors of the global economy. Our world is propelled by media and entertainment. Where do you think all the millions of people who put together all the creative stuff - a la tv, film, music, web, adverts, radio etc. etc. come from? Have you ever wondered why the credits on a film take so long to roll? That's because THOUSANDS of people can be needed to make just one film - not including those who were left unlisted, or why galleries are constantly updating their collections and new exhibits pop up every day - because there are THOUSANDS of artists creating new and valid work, why bookstores and libraries are so huge - why there's so much choice in music, why there's no list of all the contributors in magazines and web content- because if they put together all of the photographers/designers/illustrators/writers/researchers involved and tried to print it there just wouldn't be room....same for the music industry - its not just commercial tracks that have hundreds of people backing them up, there's also thousands of session musicians and pit musicians working in the uk - the people who write and produce the music for tv/film/web content. The way most people learn about the world (about the state of the financial industries or new developments in science for example) - through documentaries/news bulletins/newspapers/radio/web are all propelled by creatives.
Creative arts graduates are a massive part of the uk economy. We are also a massive part of our future cultural integrity - if we just all decided to do "more sensible" degrees I sincerely doubt the world would be a better place - unless an Orwellian nightmare is your vision of paradise.

You can't take 99.99% of TSR members seriously.

OP, your thread was a very interesting read. I wholly agree

Anyone else scan-read the thread title as 'Defence Against the Dark Arts'? :|

Can you write a TL;DR version please. I should be revising.

Fantastic rant/post - I totally agree!
Creativity is extremely important, and the Media sector is huge in this era, so more and more creative individuals are sought.
Unfortunately, there will always be ignorance towards the Creative Arts - probably as so many people don't actually realise what it involves.

I completely agree, practically everything around us is created by the creative industries. I always get told by people that doing art is pointless and i'll never get paid a lot but I don't really mind if i'm not living in luxury after uni, I just want to have a job where I love what I do =)