Current, comprehensive, and authoritative, this text gives language teachers and researchers, both a set of conceptual tools with which to think and talk about creativity in language teaching and a wealth of practical advice about principles and practices that can be applied to making their lessons more creative. Providing an overview of the nature of creativity and its role in second language education, it brings together twenty prominent language teachers and researchers with expertise in different aspects of creativity and teaching contexts to present a range of theories on both creative processes and how these processes lead to creative practices in language teaching. Unique in the field, the book takes a broader and more critical look at the notion of creativity in language learning, exploring its linguistic, cognitive, sociocultural and pedagogic dimensions. Structured in four sections— theoretical perspectives, creativity in the classroom, creativity in the curriculum, and creativity in teacher development—each chapter is supplemented by Questions for Discussion and Suggestions for Further Research. Its accessible style makes the book relevant as both a course text and a resource for practicing teachers.

"Creativity in Language and Literature is a provocative and valuable book. Its breadth of topics, variety of approaches, and self-consciously creative and dialogic nature are especially appropriate and creative ways of approaching the subject of creativity. The scope, variety and original content of this book make it a unique contribution to the field" - Professor David L. Hoover, New York University, USA This unique resource brings together contributions from creative practitioners and academic researchers working across different disciplines. Researchers, literary authors, editors, performers and film makers reflect on their work and collectively explore the art of creativity in language and literature. Creativity in Language and Literature covers a range of texts, genres and practices, such as poetry, hip hop, film, story telling, web chat and pen-friend correspondence. Each part of the book begins with an introduction and the final part includes critical responses to the idea of linguistic creativity, encouraging ongoing dialogue and debate. This richly diverse collection is an ideal text for students and practitioners working at all levels. With contributions by Patience Agbabi, Daniel Allington, R. Amritavalli, Richard D. Brown, Lynne Cameron, Ronald Carter, Guy Cook, Jon Cook, Ruth Finnegan, Angela Goddard, Ben Haggarty, Graeme Harper, G. D. Jayalakshmi, Angel Lin, Janet Maybin, Rukmini Bhaya Nair, Kate Pahl, Mario Petrucci, Rob Pope, Elena Semino, Fiona Sampson, Jane Spiro, Peter Stockwell, Joan Swann, S. Upendran and Michelene Wandor.

Language and Creativity has become established as a pivotal text for courses in English Language, Linguistics and Literacy. Creativity in language has conventionally been regarded as the preserve of institutionalised discourses such as literature and advertising, and individual gifted minds. In this ground-breaking book, bestselling author Ronald Carter explores the idea that creativity, far from being simply a property of exceptional people, is an exceptional property of all people. Drawing on a range of real examples of everyday conversations and speech, from flatmates in a student house and families on holiday to psychotherapy sessions and chat-lines, the book argues that creativity is an all-pervasive feature of everyday language. Using close analysis of naturally occurring language, taken from a unique 5 million word corpus, Language and Creativity reveals that speakers commonly make meanings in a variety of creative ways, in a wide range of social contexts and for a diverse set of reasons. This Routledge Linguistics Classic is here reissued with a new preface from the author, covering a range of key topics from e-language and internet discourse to English language teaching and world Englishes. Language and Creativity continues to build on the previous theories of creativity, offering a radical contribution to linguistic, literary and cultural theory. A must for anyone interested in the creativity of our everyday speech.

The Routledge Handbook of Language and Creativity provides an introduction to and survey of a wide range of perspectives on the relationship between language and creativity. Defining this complex and multifaceted field, this book introduces a conceptual framework through which the various definitions of language and creativity can be explored. Divided into four parts, it covers: different aspects of language and creativity, including dialogue, metaphor and humour literary creativity, including narrative and poetry multimodal and multimedia creativity, in areas such as music, graffiti and the internet creativity in language teaching and learning. With over 30 chapters written by a group of leading academics from around the world, The Routledge Handbook of Language and Creativity will serve as an important reference for students and scholars in the fields of English language studies, applied linguistics, education, and communication studies.

Can techniques traditionally thought to be outside the scope of literature, including word processing, databasing, identity ciphering, and intensive programming, inspire the reinvention of writing? The Internet and the digital environment present writers with new challenges and opportunities to reconceive creativity, authorship, and their relationship to language. Confronted with an unprecedented amount of texts and language, writers have the opportunity to move beyond the creation of new texts and manage, parse, appropriate, and reconstruct those that already exist. In addition to explaining his concept of uncreative writing, which is also the name of his popular course at the University of Pennsylvania, Goldsmith reads the work of writers who have taken up this challenge. Examining a wide range of texts and techniques, including the use of Google searches to create poetry, the appropriation of courtroom testimony, and the possibility of robo-poetics, Goldsmith joins this recent work to practices that date back to the early twentieth century. Writers and artists such as Walter Benjamin, Gertrude Stein, James Joyce, and Andy Warhol embodied an ethos in which the construction or conception of a text was just as important as the resultant text itself. By extending this tradition into the digital realm, uncreative writing offers new ways of thinking about identity and the making of meaning.

This commemorative volume comprises ten essays which celebrate the work of Walter (Bill) Nash. Bill Nash was an extraordinary scholar – a classicist, parodist, critic, musician, linguist, poet, polyglot, humourist and novelist. He was as adroit in his reading of the Old Norse sagas as he was in his analyses of the rhetorical composition of everyday English usage, and his published outputs embrace the stylistic, rhetorical, compositional and creative topographies of both language and literature. The contributions that comprise this volume are all by well-known scholars in the field and each essay celebrates Nash’s prodigious offering by covering the academic fields with which he was particularly associated. These fields include composition, rhetoric, discourse analysis, English usage, comic discourse, creative writing and the stylistic exploration of literature from the Old English period to that of the present day.

Introducing Sign Language Literature: Folklore and Creativity is the first textbook dedicated to analyzing and appreciating sign language storytelling, poetry and humour. The authors assume no prior knowledge of sign language or literary studies, introducing readers to a world of visual language creativity in deaf communities. Introducing Sign Language Literature: Folklore and Creativity - Explains in straightforward terms the unique features of this embodied language art form - Draws on an online anthology of over 150 sign language stories, poems and jokes - Suggests ways of analysing and appreciating the rich artistic heritage of deaf communities Watch a short video about the book.