Creativity, professionalism and culture - beyond benchmarking

This paper reviews the three QAA subject benchmarks in Art and Design; History of Art, Architecture and Design, and Communication, Media, Film and Cultural Studies by comparing and contrasting key subject definitions from each statement. It looks first at the use of the key terms, 'creativity', 'professionalism' and 'culture', then notes some distinctive features and absences of each statement and finally turns to the core rationales offered for the contemporary social purpose of each subject. It concludes that such comparative analysis of the benchmark statements can create the conditions for serious cross-disciplinary debate, which may ultimately prove to be the most valuable outcome of the QAA benchmarking exercise.