This special issue of TEXT responds to the current challenge faced by writers in the
academy to identify with greater precision what it is about their work which is genuinely
an original contribution to knowledge across the field of creative writing (or, more rarely,
in another field). It follows from the acclaim with which the first three Creative Writing
as Research special issues, published in TEXT in 2010, 2012 and 2014, have been met. In
those landmark collections, creative writing pieces from writers based in universities
around Australia and New Zealand were published under refereed circumstances with
statements regarding their status as research attached. Not only – as reader feedback told
us – did TEXT’s readership enjoy consuming a range of creative work from creative
writing academic researchers, they also found the research statements useful as models
for their own practice and others in their universities.