Creativity & Genre

            Creativity is an important aspect of many decisions in life, one of them being the AICE exam I will be taking for this class in just a few short months. In the TedTalk “The Theory of Creativity” the speaker discusses the importance of playfulness and fun in discovering big ideas. The speaker references to Disney and how the company was set apart from other big corporations because most of their best ideas were thought of during fun and creativity. The speaker also discusses how failure is not as important as many people make it out to be and adds the quote “the opposite of bravery is not cowardice, it’s conformity” to the end of his TedTalk to solidify his point. 

In the “describe yourself” activity we did in class, we were forced to think creatively to show how ordinary items describe us. I chose the prompt of “things in your closet” for this activity and it was challenging to think of ten things in my closet and how they represent me. One item in my closet that I discussed was my boots “because I wear them when I go line dancing”, this is representative of me because I enjoy going line dancing with my friends but that isn’t common knowledge. The article “An Interview with Ron Beghetto: Subtle Nuances of Creativity in Learning and Life” also highlights the importance of creativity. In the interview Beghetto discusses that even though teachers have to follow a specific curriculum, there are still ways to be creative with learning in the classroom. An example used was how math teachers could have students try to solve an equation a different way, because this is out-of-the-norm it is creative. This same methodology can be applied to creating a magazine, thinking outside-of-the-box can lead to appealing and unique ideas for my magazine, design wise as well as content wise.  

My family has always lived in Florida and we regularly travel to Georgia, Tennessee, and the Carolinas, this has instilled a strong love for the south in my heart. My affection for the south is what led me to choose southern magazines as my focus area. The two magazines I decided to study were Southern Living and the Magnolia Journal. Southern Living and the Magnolia Journal portray the same overall southern aesthetic to their magazines. There are multiple sections to these magazines and many focus on food, home décor, beauty, or garden tips. These four topics have a large appeal for southern women, this is coming from someone with a family from the deep south, and it’s ultimately the reason southern magazines have stayed afloat all these years. I plan to keep these four basic groups of magazines in the south, but I might change around the design and theme to appeal to a newer audience.