Artificial Intelligence, Creativity, and the Shifting Grounds of Authorship in Cultural Sociology

This chapter critically examines how artificial intelligence is transforming creative practice and authorship through a cultural sociological lens. While acknowledging AI systems’ capabilities in pattern recognition and recombination, it argues they fundamentally lack capacity for paradigm-shifting cultural innovation. The study analyses three key dimensions: the transformation of authorship through machine learning, the emergence of human-algorithmic practices, and methodological approaches to AI-mediated cultural production. The paper challenges techno-optimistic narratives by demonstrating how AI’s apparent democratisation of creative tools may mask new forms of creative alienation and corporate control over collective cultural heritage. This contribution advocates for theoretical frameworks capable of redirecting these developments toward more equitable forms of cultural production, emphasising the continued primacy of embodied human experience in genuine creative innovation.