Creative collaboration in a hybrid context: Becoming co-present and vulnerable in the writing of a TV series

Seminar summary

In this talk, Leo Bancou will share the findings of research carried out as part of his doctoral thesis. It focuses on a European programme in creative screenwriting for a TV series, which involved numerous group writing workshops. He conducted a rich organizational ethnography throughout the 44-day programme, collecting extensive observation and interview data from both physical and digital sites. The paper he presents, which is under development, focuses on how experiences of co-presence shape creative collaboration. He examines how programme participants may have varied and sometimes paradoxical experiences of co-presence, which can be digitally mediated or hybrid. This influences both their sense of inclusion/exclusion and their collective creativity. He will present first-hand data as well as theorizing efforts. In particular, these involve the mobilisation of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s processual phenomenology and Judith Butler’s concept of shared vulnerability to shed light on the embodied, ethical, and affective dimensions of co-presence. By studying participants’ lived experiences from such a combined framework, this paper seeks to contribute to emerging research on creative collaboration in new forms of working and organising.

How to attend this seminar

This seminar will take place on Wednesday 6 December at 12pm.

We welcome you to join us at our Colchester Campus in room EBS.2.65.

Speaker bio

Leo Bancou

Leo Bancou is a PhD researcher in management and organisational studies at Paris-Dauphine University. He is interested in the changing nature of work and organisations in the digital age. His thesis focuses on the topic of co-presence and how it is experienced and organised in technology-enabled, hybrid ways of working. Using an ethnographic approach, he has conducted fieldwork with project teams in various sectors (e.g., consultants, engineering projects). He draws primarily on phenomenological perspectives and process philosophy to consider the bodily, fluid, and technologically mediated nature of contemporary work experiences.