Research-Creation: Intervention, Analysis and “Family Resemblances”

“Research-creation” is an emergent category within the social sciences and humanities that speaks to contemporary media experiences and modes of knowing. Research-creation projects typically integrate a creative process, experimental aesthetic component, or an artistic work as an integral part of a study. The focus of this article is how this practice contributes to the research agenda of the digital humanities and social sciences. We discuss how the term has been articulated in academic policy discourses and examine some prominent academic analyses that describe the practice of research-creation. We then unravel, enumerate, and expand upon the concept of research-creation from the purview of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s notion of “family resemblances” before moving to a discussion of four modes of research-creation: “research-for-creation,” “research-from-creation,” “creative presentations of research,” and finally “creation-as-research.”