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All Hands on Deck: Evaluation in Creative Industries

Sun, August 17, 8:30 to 10:10am, TBA

Abstract

As creative goods are of subjective quality, previous research in different research streams have separately focused on their evaluation on three levels. First internally coded features of the object may signal, or be representative of, its perceived quality. In turn, the status of the object’s creator –defined by background and past performance –may serve as a proxy in the evaluation of quality, or may influence evaluative perception of objects given their creation by celebrated or uncelebrated hands. Finally, the sponsoring organization - defined as the firm or imprint which produces and promotes an object made by a creator –may serve as a signal for both the “talent” of the creator and the “quality” of the objects he or she creates. Prizes, awards, and other field configuring events provide ideal settings for studying these multiple levels of evaluation in tandem. Using an original dataset on the full population of submissions to the Booker Prize for Fiction from 1983-1991 (N=1094), we find evidence of heterarchichal evaluation across all three of these levels, suggesting an integrative approach in which multiple levels need be considered in the study cultural evaluation. We conclude that for creative goods for which quality cannot be objectively or universally determined, multiple levels of evaluation are all made useful. In short, all hands are called to deck.

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