Задание: Отрабатывай беглое чтение первой и второй частей диалога. Переведи диалог.
ЧАСТЬ 1
Andrew: Hey everybody! My name is Andrew.
Morag: And my name is Morag.
Andrew: And you are listening to Culips.
Andrew: Hey Morag!
Morag: Hey Andrew! How’s it going?
Andrew: I’m doing not too bad. How about yourself?
Morag: I’m alright. Gearing up for a day at work pretty soon here. You know exciting things. Ha-ha.
Andrew: Morag, you work in a creative field, don’t you?
Morag: I do. I write for a living. Yeah, a lot of it. Sort of creative and some of it is marketing. Although that can be maybe creative too. I don’t know.
Andrew: I think so. That’s great because today the topic of our Chatterbox episode is creativity.
Morag: Ooh!
Andrew: Ha-ha. So maybe you’ll be able to speak with some expertise. That’s great. But before we get started in our discussion about creativity, I would like to let everybody know about the study guide for this episode. It’s available now on our website culips.com. So, if you would like to study with the study guide, head on over to culips.com to give it a download. It includes the transcript for this episode, also some detailed vocabulary, explanations and examples, a quiz and also some prompts that you can use for conversation practice or writing practice. So, yeah, check out the website for this study guide.
Ok, Morag, creativity. Let’s start with a definition and then this might be hard even for English speakers to define. But if you could briefly and simply describe in your own words. Now it sounds like a test question.
Morag: It does. Okay!
Andrew: Creativity. What would you say?
Morag: I’ll give us a shot. So, I think that creativity is the skill or ability or facility to make things that are new, to come up with ideas that are new and different. Or to make art which is the sort of the same thing. Because you know, you don’t just copy someone exactly when you’re making art or your writing. You have to create something from new. You have to create something that has never existed before to make it your own. So it’s that ability to make those things or come up with those ideas. But there is a lot of different avenues that people can be creative in. So not just a painting or writing. People also need to use their creativity to think new thoughts and creative thoughts in other areas as well.
Andrew: Very good definition.
Morag: So maybe not so succinct. I’m sorry.
Andrew: Well, if I would boil that down then I guess I could just say that creativity is the skill to make something that didn’t exist before or to do something differently. Think in a different way
Morag: Yeah that sounds good. I agree.
Andrew: Cool.
Morag: Thank you for the summary!
Andrew: So I think it was an interesting distinction that you said just a moment ago about there being kind of two different types of creativity. What immediately pops into my mind is the arts, when I think of creativity. Painting or music. There is also creativity like problem solving. Coming up with a more efficient way to do something. This is creativity too. Right?
Morag: No, I mean a lot of scientists can be creative because they have to try to think of something new, something that a way that something might be done in nature or in whatever and adjust it. So that’s quite creative to come up with this idea of something that might be possible.
Andrew: So would you consider yourself a creative person?
Morag: At this point, I would say “yes” because other people consider me to be a creative person. I’ve done jobs where people will be like “Oh, we need creative. We need somebody who can come and put the staff”. But I don’t feel super creative.
I write for a living but I will spend a lot of time looking at a blank page, not having any idea what I should put on it. You know?
Andrew: I get that feeling a lot as well. And actually, you know that one of the adjectives that I used to describe myself on my resume is creative. So I kind of market myself as being creative too and I do think from time to time I have spurts of creativity. It kind of comes in waves for me. I don’t know.
Morag: I think a lot of things that people consider to be creative those are things that can … or you need to learn how to do it, you need to hone. You know? So nobody is born knowing how to paint.
Andrew: Right.
Morag: There still something you need to do. Something you need to learn before you can use all that creativity and pick. For a lot of people, the creative things that they’ve done have also been things that they’ve learned.
Andrew: Right. It’s almost like a skill.
ЧАСТЬ 2
Morag: Yeah, totally. I wouldn’t be able to write if I didn’t know how to write. You know like physical things writing and reading. You know, you could maybe be able to think of the most amazing things in the world. But if you do not know how to put it down, that’s a problem. So but like what are some of the creative things that you’ve done?
Andrew: Some of the creative projects I’ve done, for example?
Morag: Yeah.
Andrew: Well, I think the way that I think of myself as being creative is
Morag: That’s really cool. But I am envious though. Cause I always have to work for the ideas and put out a lot of bad ideas before I get to the good ones.
Andrew: Well, actually you know that’s a huge part of the process too. For every song that I’ve written that I think is any good there is a hundred that I’ve thrown out cause I’ve been terrible. So?
Morag: Yeah, it also I mean, that that’s something to think about too. It’s not just about being able to make all of these things but also having the judgment to know which ones are good.
Andrew: Yes! Yeah, yeah.
Morag: Which ones to keep. Yeah.
Andrew: So what kind of creative things then do you do, Morag?
Morag: Basically just write. I loved playing music when I was younger but I am like an entire musically creator. I am entire musically creator. I could only play music if it’s sheet music written out in front of me.
Andrew: Ah, you’re the opposite of me.
Morag: Yeah, I know. If you tell me to just make sounds I will freak out and run away. So scary. But I never really drew or anything like that and I didn’t do drawings or art. No, I just always put words on paper.
Andrew: I see, that’s very cool. Now a big question around creativity is if some people are more creative than others or if we are all born with the same amounts of creativity. And actually in doing some preparation for this episode I watched a YouTube video with a speaker called Matthew Jarvis. And he is a designer and an instructor at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California. I thought we could listen to a clip of him answering the question if some people are more creative than others. So why don’t we take a listen to that clip now.
Matthew Jarvis: But essentially what it is it’s a survival skill. It’s a survival set of skills. And you would have a really difficult time not being creative. And that’s one of the things that a lot of people, you know, when you are in this creative orchestra everyone is like “How am I gonna be more creative?”, “How am I gonna get better ideas?” and bla bla bla. But the truth of the matter is that you’re already creative when you wake up in the morning. And your car is in the shop and your bike has a flat tire. How are you going to get to work? That is a creative challenge. Parenting is a creative challenge. The idea that there are some people who are creative and other people who aren’t is false.
Andrew: Okay Morag. So, Matthew Jarvis seems to think that everybody is creative, right? He said that creativity is a set of survival skills and if you aren’t creative you actually can’t live. You won’t have the knowledge to make it through your day. What do you think about this? Do you agree?
Morag: I actually really like his definition of creativity, because it’s mostly about problem solving and being able to put two things together or make decisions on the fly. And definitely what he was saying about how you would have a really difficult time not being creative. At least also even in my like creative work-life, a lot of it feels like I wouldn’t have a job if I didn’t do this. So I better do it, you know. So, I do. You know and it just needs happen because it must.
Andrew: Right.
Morag: You know and this I learned with University like writing papers in that sort of thing. You have to do it. You need to do it. So, do it. You know. But you also have to come up with something. And so you have to. You do and that is a creative thing. So yeah figuring out. I think getting dressed in the morning as a creative statement.
Andrew: Yeah, definitely. It can be.