Readings, Lectures, and Discussions
PART 1: DEFINING AND EXPLORING CONSTRUCTIVE COMMUNICATION
Feb 16: How might we define constructive (public/private) communication?
We will explore what constructive communication means for everyone in the group by inviting a dialogue around the foundational concepts of communication, conversation, and constructive and the emerging field of Constructive Communication Systems. Using people’s individual experiences as starting points, we will invite students and instructors to share a conversation that they perceived or felt as constructive and use the diversity of everyone’s experiences as a scaffold to build on the core concepts of the class.
Readings:
Anderson, R., Baxter, L., & Cissna, K. (2004). Texts and contexts of dialogue. In Dialogue: Theorizing difference in communication studies. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications, pp. 1-18.
Black, L. (2008). Deliberation, storytelling and dialogic moments. Communication Theory, 18, pp. 93-116.
Bohm, D. (1996). On dialogue. New York: Routledge, pp. 1-5.
Stone, D., Patton, P., and Heen, S. (1999). Difficult conversations: How to discuss what matters most. New York: Viking Penguin, pp. 1-20.
Optional:
Mast, J., Coesemans, R., Temmerman, M. (2019). Constructive journalism: Concepts, practices, and discourses. Journalism, 20(4), pp. 492-503. doi:10.1177/1464884918770885.
Feb 23: The content in the context. What are the primary elements that define a communication context?
We focus on constructive communication contexts across the continuum of public/private conversations (working definition: dialogues & conversations that bring together different sets of people who may/may not have shared experiences or have different opinions about a ‘difficult’ topic). We will explore the features that inform and support a facilitated process and focus on the elements that make each communication process unique. We will build on the knowledge acquired by reviewing specific examples (historical and present) to address the question of what could be considered constructive in these contexts.
Possible examples include:
The Habermasian public sphere
The Five Nations of the Iroquois
Athenian Democracy
New England Town Hall
Highlander Folk School
Internet/Social Media
Readings:
Cissna, K., & Anderson, R. (2004). Public dialogue and intellectual history: hearing multiple voices. In R. Anderson, L. A. Baxter, & K. N. Cissna (Eds.), Dialogue: Theorizing difference in communication studies. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications, pp. 193-208.
Kubina, E., et al. (2021). Personal experiences bridge moral and political divides better than facts, PNAS February 9, 2021 118 (6), https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2008389118
Porlezza, C. (2019). From participatory culture to participatory fatigue: The problem with the public, Social Media + Society, https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305119856684.
Turkle, S. (2015). Reclaiming conversation: The power of talk in a digital age. New York: Penguin Books, pp. 1-56.
Mar 2: A framework to review communication spaces in the past and today
We will build on the knowledge acquired during the previous week and work on a framework that will help us in reviewing, evaluating and reimagining the design of contemporary constructive communication spaces. We will apply this framework on discussing and reviewing the techniques and the tools that can be used to support facilitated conversations.
Readings:
Herzig, M. and Chasin, L. (2006). Fostering dialogue across divides: A nuts and bolts guide from the Public Conversations Project. Watertown, MA: The Public Conversations Project, pp. 59-92.
Sinek, S. (2011). Communication is not about speaking. It’s about listening. In Start with why: How great leaders inspire everyone to take action. New York: Penguin Books, pp. 160-171.
Sunstein, C. R. (2020). Too Much Information: Understanding What You Don't Want to Know, Cambridge: The MIT Press, pp. 11-37 & 109-117.
Optional:
Stains, R. (2012). Reflection for connection: Deepening dialogue through reflective processes, Conflict Resolution Quarterly, 30:1, pp. 33-51.
Mar 9: No class (Monday schedule of classes to be held)
PART 2: THEORIES, TECHNIQUES AND PRACTICES OF FACILITATED CONVERSATIONS
Mar 16: Why do we gather? The building blocks of purposeful and relatable facilitated gatherings
We will invite students to join a facilitated conversation and experience the process of planning and designing. This first-hand experience will give students the opportunity to reflect on the importance of setting a purpose for our gathering, performing grounding rituals and connecting beyond divides. The building blocks will provide the groundwork for designing and “wireframing” a facilitated experience.
Readings:
Berger, W. (2014). A more beautiful question. The power of inquiry to spark breakthrough ideas, Bloomsbury, pp. 11-38
Muztm D. C. (2006). Benefits of hearing the other side. In Hearing the other side: deliberative versus participatory democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 57-87.
Stains, Jr., R. (2014). Repairing the breach: The power of dialogue to heal relationships and communities. Journal of Public Deliberation, 10:1, article 7, pp. 1-5.
Optional:
Parker, P. (2020). The art of gathering. How we meet and why it matters, pp. 1-34.
Mar 23: No class - Student holiday
Mar 30: How might we apply design thinking on facilitated conversations?
In this session, we will integrate facilitation and design thinking modalities to design a process that considers the purpose and the arc of the event, the invited participants, the desired outcomes and the alignment with the needs of stakeholders. We will experiment with creating a robust, yet iterative, scaffold for the design of a technology-supported and technology-enhanced facilitated experience.
Readings:
Brown, T. (2009). A Mental Matrix or “These People Have No Process!”, In Change by Design, New York: HarperCollins, pp.69-92.
Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking Fast and Slow, pp. 19-58.
The Field Guide to Human-Centered Design (2015). By IDEO.org (link), pp. 9-25
Apr 6: Formats of facilitated conversations
We will experiment with and experience diverse formats of facilitation (in-person, remote, visual). We will review specific case studies and approaches to facilitated conversations and develop a toolkit for crafting constructive communication spaces.
Readings:
Stillman, D. (2020). Conversations have structure. In Good Talk: How to Design Conversations that Matter, pp. 31-52.
Ulibarri, N. et al. (2020). Creativity in research: Cultivate clarity, be innovative, and make progress in your research journey, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 21-72.
Qvist-Sorensen, O. and Baarstrup, L. (2019). Visual collaboration: A powerful toolkit for improving meetings, projects, and processes
PART 3: DESIGN AND EVALUATE NEW COMMUNICATION SPACES
Apr 13: Can constructive conversations scale? The role of technology in designing and scaling facilitated conversations
We will review the role that technology can play in designing and scaling facilitated conversations. We will focus on Local Voices Network (LVN), a system that combines facilitated, tech-scaffolded constructive conversation to bring underheard community voices, perspectives, and stories across the country into the center of a healthier public dialogue.
Readings:
Papacharissi, Z. (2021). Democracy on the run. In After democracy: Imagining our political future. New Haven; London: Yale University Press, pp. 19-50.
Wihbey, J. (2019). Digital networks and democracy’s needs. In The Social Fact, Cambridge: The MIT Press, pp. 1-24.
van Dijck, J., & Poell, T. (2015). Social media and the transformation of public space, Social Media + Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305115622482
Optional:
Owen, H. (2008). Open space technology, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, pp. 1-13 (link to read).
Sutton-Smith, B. (2006). Play and ambiguity. In The game design reader: A rules of play anthology, Cambridge: The MIT Press, pp. 296-313.
Apr 20: No class - Student holiday
April 27: Developing frameworks for facilitated conversations
How can we create new technology-mediated platforms for communication and learning that are shaped by the wisdom of “ancient social technologies” of facilitated conversation, coaching, and storytelling? In this session, we will review the design and prototyping of digital tools for scaffolding conversation, deep listening, storytelling, and story-sharing.
Readings:
Black, L. (2008). Deliberation, storytelling and dialogic moments. Communication Theory, 18, pp. 93-116.
Heath, C. & Heath, D. (2017). Create shared meaning. In The Power of Moments. New York: Simon & Schuster, pp. 205-223.
Stains, Jr., R. (2016). Cultivating courageous communities through the practice and power of dialogue, Mitchell Hamline Law Review, 42:5, pp. 1519-1545.
May 4: Tools and methods for sense-making across facilitated conversations
We will focus on the development of tools and methods for making sense of patterns within and across facilitated conversations. We will review tools that have been designed, developed and prototyped by MIT Center for Constructive Communication (CCC) and apply them on selected collections/communication spaces. We will experiment with different types of data and formats, from Twitter data to focus group transcripts.
Readings:
Light, B., Burgess, J., Duguay, S. (2018). The walkthrough method: An approach to the study of apps, New Media and Society, 20:3, pp. 881-900.
Matassi, M., & Boczkowski, P. (2021). An agenda for comparative social media studies: The value of understanding practices from cross-national, cross-media, and cross-platform perspectives. International Journal Of Communication, 15, 22, pp. 207-228.
Peterson-Salahuddin, C. and Diakopoulos, N. (2020). Negotiated autonomy: The role of social media algorithms in editorial decision making, Media and Communication, 8:3, pp. 27-38.
May 11: Measuring and scaling the “health” of constructive conversations
In this last session, we will experiment with measuring conversation quality with the aim of providing new goals for optimizing communication systems. We will build on the ongoing work of MIT Center for Constructive Communication that includes development of new data coding schemes, and models for estimating “conversation quality indicators” of speech and text data.
Readings:
Anderson, R., Baxter, L., & Cissna, K. (2004). Concluding voices, conversation fragments, and a temporary synthesis. In Dialogue: Theorizing difference in communication studies, Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications, pp. 259-268.
Kent, M. L., & Taylor, M. (2021). Fostering dialogic engagement: Toward an architecture of social media for social change. Social Media + Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305120984462
Guzman, A. L., & Lewis, S. C. (2020). Artificial intelligence and communication: A Human–Machine Communication research agenda. New Media & Society, 22(1), 70–86. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444819858691
Optional:
Burgess, J. and Hurcombe, E. (2019). Digital journalism as symptom, response, and agent of change in the platformed media environment, Digital Journalism, 7:3, pp. 359-367.
Jameson, J. K., & Lee, N. M. (2020). Introduction to the special issue on Dialogue 2.0: New perspectives, enduring challenges, and promising directions. Social Media + Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305120984468.