On Cultural Entrepreneurship Tracing the discourse(s) of a term

Cultural Entrepreneurship as a field of study is still in a nascent, immature state. In the last two decades, it has gained traction from a broad variety of disciplines, evidently addressing a phenomenon of relevance and interest to a range of academic discourses. In the social sciences, language is the tool-box, and words and concepts are the tools with which scholars work. The various disciplines claim the term, without showing awareness of parallel conversations on similar phenomena. This partially results from and partially perpetuates the ambiguous nature of the concepts that make up the term: ’culture’ and ’entrepreneurship’. In the current state, ’cultural entrepreneurship’ is inadequately grounded, attenuating its use as theoretical concept and analytical tool. Associations concerning entrepreneurship, a term firmly situated in economic disciplines, skews the conversation and inhibits the discourses’ interdisciplinary potential. Therefore, an alternative term, ”cultural gardening”, is suggested. This term more clearly reflects the recent conversation on ’meaning cultivation’ and cultural change as a procedural, societal conversation. The term shifts the emphasis away from entrepreneurialism, in order to distinguish the discourses on meaning cultivation from those on entrepreneurship within the creative and cultural industries. This thesis provides an interface for the various parallel discourses to interact through, opening up for more diverse, interdisciplinary research.