At American University, students, faculty, and staff prioritize productive conversations about difficult topics through Dialogue Across Differences, an ongoing series fostering a more inclusive and connected campus. Gathering in small groups, participants from all corners of AU embrace challenging discussions guided by facilitators. A student-produced documentary by Giovana Roskosz Reis offers an unfiltered look at campus perspectives on civil discourse. Through candid interviews, students share their thoughts on the current climate at AU and the question: how do we build an inclusive community where belonging and voice are not just words but lived and felt experience across campus?
Hear from students on how productive dialogue builds a more inclusive campus:
There is a necessity for, you know, having uncomfortable conversations, especially in today’s society, especially when you are at a university. I mean, that should be—I would even argue—the mission is to engage in dialogue that sometimes is going to make you feel uncomfortable, that you’re not going to know how to, you know, how to navigate those waters. But at the end of the day, I think it’s fair to say that that’s the strength of it all, is that when you are in those uncomfortable spaces, you grow.
Michael McGee-McCoy
In this environment, I don’t think we need to be tiptoeing around the hard conversations. I think this is the place to learn to engage with other perspectives, and to learn to empathize and communicate compassionately. I think the only way forward in a lot of these global conflicts and just general progress is that we need to be able to hear each other first. Nothing’s going to change if we can’t hear each other and this needs to start here.
Carla Grinstead, MA
Explore more at AU’s Dialogue Across Difference.
Photo credit: American University
Video credit: American University, Office of Inclusive Excellence
Back to the Map
