Engage with the issues

Difference isn’t issue-based and doesn’t focus on one specific divide or fracture. However, through the act of listening to stories and reflecting on experiences the course creates an opportunity to consider the issues that are most important for you and your wider community. These could relate to race, class, gender, climate justice or many other things.

Engaging well with these issues means welcoming people’s experience and story. We often steer away from difficult conversations that may reveal disagreement, but try not to close down a space where different views are shared. Welcome lively conversations with respectful sharing of different perspectives.

If a discussion begins to take over a session, ask participants to pause, thank them for engaging so honestly and suggest you revisit it after the session. You could meet with them individually or together if that gives more space to listen, and you could revisit the issue as a group at the Re-Gathering after the final session