Co-Creativity and Community: Pragmatic Genres in Early Modern England
This research initiative focuses on pragmatic texts such as Elizabeth Okeover's recipe book from the late 17th century. This manuscript, which includes medical and culinary recipes, was produced through contributions from multiple authors and reflects the collaborative practices of early modern knowledge creation. Such texts document co-creative processes and illustrate how communal authorship reveals the interactions between families, neighbours, and social networks.
This project investigates which co-creative processes can be observed in these genres, what distinctive characteristics they exhibit, and whether they contribute to the emergence or strengthening of communities. The aim is to systematically capture these dynamics. To achieve this, the investigation combines a heterological and an autological perspective: the heterological analysis focuses on the conditions of collaborative text production, such as workshops or familial networks, while the autological perspective examines the texts themselves as reflections and expressions of co-creativity.
Thus, this endeavour demonstrates how pragmatic texts reflect creativity as a process and contribute to the formation of community.
