‘You go away happier in your heart’: The generativity of a women’s community learning jewellery-making group

Abstract

Within the growing body of research on creative arts practices in community settings and mental health and well-being, the craft of jewellery-making has not featured strongly, and understanding from contextual, critical sociological perspectives has not been widely developed. This article reports on ethnographic research undertaken with an older women’s adult community learning (ACL) jewellery-making group, using theories of ecological and relational agency and insights from feminist theorizing to help elucidate its social, creative, educational and mental health and well-being-related generative processes. Findings are presented along two main, interrelated themes: creative agency and shared learning, and the social generativity of the group. The focus is on the transgressive, resistive and expansive aspects of the group’s interactions within the wider socio-economic, sociopolitical and cultural context of the women’s lives. Implications for enacting the mental health and well-being agenda in ACL are discussed.