14-15, December 2013

The Awaji Yumebutai International Conference Center, Awaji City

HERNANDEZ Alvaro

Kobe University, Graduate School of Humanities

The 6thInternational Association of Cultural and Creative Industries Symposium was organized in this occasion by Kobe University, Graduate School of Humanities, and aimed the discussion and exchange of ideas on topical subjects on cultural and creative industries, on the basis of case studies, rigorous data analysis, ongoing researches and insiders professional opinion in each field. The symposium had the presence of panelists from seven different countries (Australia, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, and the UK), which lead to a fruitful debate from many different perspectives. 

The main topics of the presentations and the following discussions focused in subjects that may be briefly listed as follows:

New trends and new contexts in the cultural industries, mainly focusing television and movies industries, and regarding aspects on coproduction and collaborative production of contents and values, strategies for emerging industries, and the effects or possible challenges posed by new media context like internet. Regarding the national production of contents and the cultural polices related, the discussion approached also to the changing Asian international scene in cultural production and consumption of cultural goods, pointing to the need to reassess the place of cultural industries in countries like China and Japan. 

The impact of globalization and the international flow of contents, whether on the impact of Asian (mainly Chinese and Japanese) cultural industries in other cultural regions and their markets and industries, or on the impact of the cultural industries coming from the global markets over the local or regional industries and productions. The potentially creative and productive link between the global and the regional was approached from many examples like tourism, regional cultural branding, as well as the production of “Asian contents” towards global audiences. 

The cultural and social dimension of each topic of discussion, seeking to contribute to a better understanding of the role of cultural and contents industries in specific social dynamics, that is, the mutual relation between audiences and cultural production, the cultural and social value added by the industry, and the cultural factors in local and global markets, shaping taste, ways of consumption and trends, as well as new cultural industries, in a general process which can be addressed as “new cultural waves”.