Digital Arts Lecturer gives keynote speech at the World Conference on Cultural Industries
Digital Arts Lecturer gives keynote speech at the World Conference on Cultural Industries
David James, Subject Leader in Digital Arts, gave the keynote speech at the World Conference on Cultural Industries, held at the Communication University of China in Beijing, in October.
David’s theme was the evaluation of the potential of the world media environment in which we operate, considering, first, the problems that corporate control might present to cultural development and a global shared prosperity, secondly, how we might tap into the reserves of the immense investment in the cultural industries, thirdly, the importance of the individual in this corporate world as a generator of creative ideas and as a world communicator and, finally, the importance of higher education in shaping graduates who will contribute to this developmental process. He referred to the Chinese philosophy of ‘soft power’ that stems from values, cultures and institutions.
Before the conference in Beijing, David, who has nearly 30 years’ experience as an art director in ITV, gave a lecture in creative thinking at the Communication University’s campus in Nanjing and then conducted a two-hour forum in pedagogic methodologies in digital media. Part of the discussions outside the events involved the possibility of collaborative ventures between the Communication University, which has 30,000 students, and the University of Worcester.