Linguistic creativity has been studied in multidisciplinary research fields including theoretical and applied linguistics, stylistics, sociolinguistics, literary studies, communication studies, cultural studies, media studies, anthropology, and education. However, there is no agreement on the factors that motivate the creative use of language. This paper reviewed case studies of linguistic analysis of creativity and argued that linguistic creativity involves at least three factors: markedness of construal, rhetorical effect, and deviation from the norm. First, cognitive linguistic studies on personal pronouns in English reveal that a creative expression reflects marked cognitive construal involving subjectivity. Second, rhetorical studies on framing show that metaphors yield rhetorical effects to create a new perspective on communicative situations, which can lead to changes in cognition, emotion, and action. Third, research on Japanese-as-a-second-language learners points out that misuse by learners includes features of novel expression that may give rise to new uses by native speakers. Cognitive linguistics, rhetoric, and second language acquisition research have shared an interest in linguistic creativity, but few attempts have been made to integrate the knowledge acquired by individual studies. Future work will include empirical research focusing on a single linguistic phenomenon involving creativity from different theoretical angles, which will shed new light on the theory of linguistic creativity.