IUP's chapter of the national Difficult Dialogues program will offer a virtual workshop session on Thursday, November 19, 2020 from 10:00 to 11:30 a.m. The workshop will prepare you to engage in conversations with people holding views different from your own.
This workshop is for everyone in our IUP community—students, staff, and faculty—who has ever wished they knew how to respond when someone says something upsetting. When confronted with a hurtful or even offensive remark, it's tough to know what to do, especially in the heat of the moment. Ignoring or running from the situation isn't right, but most of us simply don't know what to do, and fear that speaking up with only make things worse.
Let's make IUP—and the world—a better place.
Email Felicia Daniel (fdaniel@iup.edu) or Adam Jones (adjones@iup.edu) to register for this workshop.
“Stopping the Moment: How to Respond to Upsetting Remarks”
A Difficult Dialogues Workshop
90 minutes
This workshop will introduce the basic principles of Difficult Dialogues, providing techniques to respond to an offensive or upsetting statement. Moments like this can occur peer-to-peer, colleague-to-colleague, and inside and outside of the classroom. It is hard to know what to say in the moment, so we often avoid saying anything at all.
Using the tools of Difficult Dialogues, we will learn ways to engage in the conversation instead of running from it. This workshop is open to all—students, staff, and faculty—regardless of any prior experience (or not) with Difficult Dialogues.
Please Note: This is the same workshop presented during the first week of the fall 2020 semester.
This Difficult Dialogues workshop is sponsored in partnership with the Social Equity and Title IX Office, the Elephant in the Room series, the Free Speech Project, SPATE (Simulation Performance and Applied Theatre Ensemble), the Department of Theatre, Dance, and Performance, the Center for Multicultural Student Leadership and Engagement, and the Women's and Gender Studies Program.