The Practice of Intergroup Dialogue Across Eductional Settings

Abstract

Consciousness-raising educational efforts, that help learners critically examine the sociopolitical structures that create and sustain discrimination and disadvantage (Larson, 2014) are needed. Friere (1979) suggests that the most promising approaches to educating for critical consciousness reflect three interconnected components; an in-depth understanding of the world, reflection on social and political contradictions, and taking action against oppressive elements in one's own life (Friere, 1979). Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) is one evidence-based approach that uses critical pedagogy and experiential learning to help students develop a structural analysis of how power and privilege are related to various types of inequalities (Gurin, Nagda, & Zuniga, 2013). Evidence suggests that IGD is an effective approach to reducing prejudice and increasing intergroup understanding, collaboration and action among learners (Dessel, Rogge, & Garlington, 2006; Lopez & Zuniga, 2010; Maxwell, Nagda, & Thompson, 2011; Schoem & Hurtado, 2001; Zuniga et al., 2007). While the majority of research on IGD tends to examine outcomes, less is known about how students experience and navigate the cognitive and affective processes that facilitate the aforementioned outcomes. This dissertation seeks to understand the ways in which IGD fostered critical consciousness among students. Across these three studies, IGD served as a promising approach that enabled high school and undergraduate students to increase their understanding of the world around them, to engage in critical (self) reflection, and the findings across these studies also demonstrated students’ ability to take action to incorporate their new learnings into their everyday lives. Although the experiential nature of the course proved challenging at times, the vast majority of students reported that the dialogic challenges supported their ability to apply critical dialogue skills across both contexts. Analyses also revealed that IGD was instrumental in the development of students’ listening skills. In particular analyses revealed that students' may have developed a more integrated form of listening, or conscious listening which involves the integration of multiple senses (e.g. eyes, heart, mind, ears) that promoted their ability to awareness across all three domains (context, content and intrapersonal). Analyses from the high school study, revealed that IGD supported students’ sociopolitical development. While, there is not sufficient evidence to suggest that a school-wide approach is feasible, evaluation of the pilot program was appropriate and conducive to high school students, in the third study, there More trials are needed to further develop a programming model that addresses the unique contingencies embedded in the school environment; which include, the duration of each meeting was limited to 40 minutes and inconsistent access to physical space within the school.