Intergroup dialogue is a "face-to-face
facilitated conversation between members of two or more social identity groups that strives to create new levels of understanding, relating, and action".
This process promotes conversation around controversial issues, specifically, in order to generate new "collective visions" that uphold the dignity of all people.
Intergroup dialogue is based in the philosophies of the democratic and
popular education
Popular education is a concept grounded in notions of class, political struggle, and social transformation. The term is a translation from the Spanish educación popular or the Portuguese educação popular and rather than the English usage ...
movements. It is commonly used on college campuses, but may assume different namesakes in other settings.
History
Intergroup dialogue is rooted in "philosophical and cultural traditions that have valued dialogue as a method of communication and inquiry" to explore shared issues. These traditions heavily influenced 20th century movements for
democratic education
Democratic education is a type of formal education that is organized democratically, so that students can manage their own learning and participate in the governance of their school. Democratic education is often specifically emancipatory, wit ...
, which included intergroup dialogue as a core objective. The application of dialogue in education was a core tenet of the democratic education movement, drawing on the work of public intellectuals like
John Dewey who in the first decades of the 20th century envisioned "schools as social centers" that "educate youth for democratic citizenship". Dewey and other advocates of democratic education at the time envisioned dialogue as "the practice of deliberative democracy".
In 1932,
Myles Horton
]
Myles Falls Horton (July 9, 1905– January 19, 1990) was an American educator, socialist, and co-founder of the Highlander Folk School, famous for its role in the Civil Rights Movement (Movement leader James Bevel called Horton "The Father ...
, a popular-education thinker, co-founded the
Highlander Research and Education Center
The Highlander Research and Education Center, formerly known as the Highlander Folk School, is a social justice leadership training school and cultural center in New Market, Tennessee. Founded in 1932 by activist Myles Horton, educator Don West ( ...
—one of the earliest U.S. mainstream examples of a community center that offered dialogue, "popular education and literacy ... as a means of promoting civic participation and social action organizing".
Later, the intergroup education movement in the 1940s and 1950s built upon
Gordon Allport
Gordon Willard Allport (November 11, 1897 – October 9, 1967) was an American psychologist. Allport was one of the first psychologists to focus on the study of the personality, and is often referred to as one of the founding figures of personali ...
's
intergroup contact theory.
This movement was a response in part to 20th-century U.S. political turmoil and social changes. The
Great Migration, which was the rapid internal movement of
African Americans from the rural South to the industrial North, contributed to considerable social unrest within the United States.
Similar effects were felt in the
Southwest
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...
with the mass migration of
Mexican Americans following
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
.
In Brazil in the 1960s,
Paulo Freire
Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (19 September 1921 – 2 May 1997) was a Brazilian educator and philosopher who was a leading advocate of critical pedagogy. His influential work '' Pedagogy of the Oppressed'' is generally considered one of the found ...
, who would become a core figure in
popular education
Popular education is a concept grounded in notions of class, political struggle, and social transformation. The term is a translation from the Spanish educación popular or the Portuguese educação popular and rather than the English usage ...
, adopted a theoretical approach to intergroup dialogue that emphasized the importance of people's own experiences, and the need to build dialogue capacity to enable people to "analyze their situation and take action to transform themselves and their conditions".
Freire's writings about "dialogue as a liberatory educational practice",
such as his book ''
Pedagogy of the Oppressed
''Pedagogy of the Oppressed'' ( pt, Pedagogia do Oprimido) is a book by Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, written in Portuguese between 1967–68, but published first in Spanish in 1968. An English translation was published in 1970, with the Por ...
'', influenced many educators throughout the Western Hemisphere to emphasize
critical consciousness
Critical consciousness, conscientization, or in Portuguese, is a popular education and social concept developed by Brazilian pedagogue and educational theorist Paulo Freire, grounded in post-Marxist critical theory. Critical consciousness focu ...
of social inequalities through "
antibias,
antiracist
Anti-racism encompasses a range of ideas and political actions which are meant to counter racial prejudice, systemic racism, and the oppression of specific racial groups. Anti-racism is usually structured around conscious efforts and deliberate a ...
,
multicultural
The term multiculturalism has a range of meanings within the contexts of sociology, political philosophy, and colloquial use. In sociology and in everyday usage, it is a synonym for " ethnic pluralism", with the two terms often used interchang ...
, or
social justice
Social justice is justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, Equal opportunity, opportunities, and Social privilege, privileges within a society. In Western Civilization, Western and Culture of Asia, Asian cultures, the concept of social ...
education".
All of these ideas and practices, combined with those of thinkers such as
John Paul Lederach
John Paul Lederach is an American Professor of International Peacebuilding at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana, and concurrently Distinguished Scholar at Eastern Mennonite University. He has written widely on conflict resolution ...
and
Harold H. Saunders about conflict transformation and
peacebuilding, have formed the foundation for intergroup dialogue.
The growing popularity of intergroup dialogue programs on college campuses coincided with other theoretical developments in higher education, including, for instance, the integration of
critical race theory into law and other fields.
Method
Goals
Intergroup dialogue is intended to build relationships amongst participants with different social identities through the use of personal storytelling, empathetic listening and interpersonal inquiry. It integrates three core educational goals: "consciousness raising, building relationships across differences and conflicts, and strengthening individual and collective capacities to promote social justice".
Intergroup dialogue distinguishes its approach from other dialogic methods such as debate and discussion:
* ''Debate'' aims to clarify pros and cons of issues, to develop critical thinking skills.
* ''Discussion'' aims to generate different perspectives on issues, to consider decisions among different options.
* ''Intergroup dialogue'' aims to increase critical self-awareness and social awareness, to increase intergroup communication, understanding and collaborative actions.
Characteristics
The following table contrasts the characteristics of debate, discussion, and dialogue:
Multi-partiality
Intergroup dialogue draws the work of
Paulo Freire
Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (19 September 1921 – 2 May 1997) was a Brazilian educator and philosopher who was a leading advocate of critical pedagogy. His influential work '' Pedagogy of the Oppressed'' is generally considered one of the found ...
whose work focuses on
consciousness raising
Consciousness raising (also called awareness raising) is a form of activism popularized by United States feminists in the late 1960s. It often takes the form of a group of people attempting to focus the attention of a wider group on some cause or ...
, a process through which members of an oppressed group come to understand the history and circumstances of their oppression.
Intergroup dialogue further aims to raise the consciousness of all participants, including those from advantaged and disadvantaged groups, through the use of multi-partial facilitation. This approach was developed by Janet Rifkin, professor at the
University of Massachusetts Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, ...
, as a method of conflict resolution, and was adopted by the Program on Intergroup Relations at the
University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
as a method of facilitating dialogue across difference of social identity.
A multi-partial approach to facilitation differs from both a neutral or impartial approach, as well as a model in which the facilitator acts as an advocate, such as in many feminist models. Multi-partial facilitation posits the presence of "dominant narratives" within dialogue, or sets of assumptions and beliefs based on socialization and cultural values.
If the facilitator were to be impartial and neutral in moments of conflict between dialogue participants, the dominant narrative would affirm the experiences and voices of the dominant group members and further marginalize the experience of marginalized participants.
A multi-partial facilitation approach differs from facilitator-advocate approaches in that it is equally invested in the participation and growth of all dialogue participants; it encourages self-reflection and awareness through engagement rather than direct confrontation, an approach based on the belief that "people who are not feeling threatened are more open to discussing their feelings and interests and are more open to discussing the effects the conflict is having on both groups". Rather than directly confronting a group member's bias, a multi-partial facilitator points out the dominant narrative when evidence of it arises, and encourages group members to share their experiences, while simultaneously encouraging a critical analysis of the underlying assumptions and narratives at play.
Counseling psychologist
Counseling psychology is a psychological specialty that encompasses research and applied work in several broad domains: counseling process and outcome; supervision and training; career development and counseling; and prevention and health. ...
Derald Wing Sue
Derald Wing Sue is a professor of counseling psychology at Columbia University. said that instructors who have not done the work of reflecting on themselves racially or culturally tend to be poor facilitators of discussions about race.
Gaining critical racial consciousness through self-exploration, as well as exploration of the experiences of other racial groups, is a prerequisite for claiming an antiracist stance and for successfully leading race talks, according to Sue.
According to education professor Ximena Zúñiga, the number one competency for facilitators—alongside small-group leadership skills—is having a deep understanding of their own social identities as well as the social identities of others.
In secondary schools and colleges
Universities worldwide offer intergroup dialogue programs to their students. Intergroup dialogue programs are frequently launched as part of larger campus diversity and social justice initiatives seeking to address tensions and conflict related to social identity, most centrally, race. Campuses vary in their approach to intergroup dialogue, "tailor
ngto the specific needs of the campus, school, academic department or student affairs unit that it serves".
Dialogue groups are generally housed in on-campus organizations or academic departments, included as course offerings in
social work,
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of empirical investigation an ...
,
psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries between ...
,
American studies
American studies or American civilization is an interdisciplinary field of scholarship that examines American literature, history, society, and culture. It traditionally incorporates literary criticism, historiography and critical theory.
Schol ...
,
peace and conflict studies and
education
Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty ...
. Students enrolled in intergroup dialogue coursework are typically required to complete supplementary readings, reflections, papers and in some cases, field work.
Teacher Matthew R. Kay, writing for
secondary school teachers, has advocated for establishing a
safe space
The term safe space refers to places "intended to be free of bias, conflict, criticism, or potentially threatening actions, ideas, or conversations". The term originated in LGBT culture, but has since expanded to include any place where a margi ...
in classrooms where students can comfortably talk about controversial topics; "authentic listening" is essential.
Evaluation and outcomes
Research shows that intergroup dialogue has positive impacts on participants' understanding of diversity and social justice issues.
After conducting a qualitative interview study with dialogue participants,
Anna Yeakley found that connecting through a "depth of personal sharing" has been shown to play a significant role in creating positive dialogue outcomes, while participants who "disconnected" in response to hurtful intergroup conflicts reported negative outcomes.
Yeakley highlighted the importance of facilitator training, and found that five facilitation skills are essential to promoting positive outcomes:
# creating a safe space,
# recognizing signs of negative processes,
# encouraging and supporting depth of personal sharing,
# engaging conflicts as teachable moments, and
# attending to identity differences in awareness and experience.
See also
*
Dialogue
*
Dialogue mapping
The issue-based information system (IBIS) is an argumentation-based approach to clarifying wicked problems—complex, ill-defined problems that involve multiple stakeholders. Diagrammatic visualization using IBIS notation is often called iss ...
*
Diversity ideologies
Diversity ideology refers to individual beliefs regarding the nature of intergroup relations and how to improve them in culturally diverse societies. A large amount of scientific literature in social psychology studies diversity ideologies as pre ...
*
Group dynamics
Group dynamics is a system of behaviors and psychological processes occurring within a social group (''intra''group dynamics), or between social groups ( ''inter''group dynamics). The study of group dynamics can be useful in understanding decision- ...
*
Intercultural communication
Intercultural communication is a discipline that studies communication across different cultures and social groups, or how culture affects communication. It describes the wide range of communication processes and problems that naturally appear w ...
*
Intercultural dialogue Intercultural dialogue (ICD) "occurs when members of different cultural groups, who hold conflicting opinions and assumptions, speak to one another in acknowledgment of those differences".Leeds-Hurwitz, W. (2014)"Intercultural dialogue" ''Key Concep ...
*
Intergroup anxiety Intergroup anxiety is the social phenomenon identified by Walter and Cookie Stephan in 1985 that describes the ambiguous feelings of discomfort or anxiety when interacting with members of other groups. Such emotions also constitute intergroup anxiet ...
*
Intergroup relations Intergroup relations refers to interactions between individuals in different social groups, and to interactions taking place between the groups themselves collectively. It has long been a subject of research in social psychology, political psycholog ...
*
Mediation
*
Prejudice
Prejudice can be an affective feeling towards a person based on their perceived group membership. The word is often used to refer to a preconceived (usually unfavourable) evaluation or classification of another person based on that person's per ...
*
Social identity theory
*
Study circle
*
Sustained dialogue
*
Transformative mediation
References
Further reading
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{{Refend
Communication studies
Group processes