Making Dialogue Effective 1: Effectiveness in Intercultural and Interfaith Dialogue: Can it be Defined? How do we Measure it?

Tue, 30 Nov 2010 18:45 in Discussion Forums

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Where: Dialogue Society, London
Panelists:

Mehri Niknam, MA, MBE, Executive Director, the Joseph Interfaith Foundation.
Simon Keyes, Director of St Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace.
Dr Andrew Smith, Scripture Union.
Dr Ute Kelly, Lecturer in Peace Studies, University of Bradford

Abstract

Part of a series of six discussions exploring how to make intercultural dialogue (a term which is intended to imply all shades of dialogue, including interfaith dialogue) more effective, this panel discussion will draw on the experience of a selection of people working in the areas of dialogue and social cohesion.

It will consider: what aims agencies and groups concerned with dialogue have; what “effectiveness” means in view of these aims and whether, and how, the effectiveness of dialogue can be measured or monitored.

Questions to be considered:

What is the point of intercultural/ interfaith dialogue?
Does it work?
What exactly are people involved in dialogue trying to achieve?
Given their/our aims, what does it mean for dialogue to be “effective”?
Can we, and should we, measure or monitor the effectiveness of dialogue?
If so, how?

Confirmed Panellists:

Mehri Niknam, MA, MBE, Executive Director, the Joseph Interfaith Foundation.
Mehri Niknam was born and brought up in Iran. Her academic field is Comparative Medieval Jewish-Muslim History, on which she has lectured at several universities. She has been a Jewish-Muslim consultant for over 15 years and considers her work a vocation.
In 2005, she was awarded the MBE for her contributions to Muslim-Jewish Relations in Britain. In the same year she was made an Honorary Fellow at Leo Baeck College-Centre for Jewish Education for her services to the College's Jewish-Muslim Interfaith Relations. She is a member of Imams and Rabbis Committee and Academics & Theologians Roundtable at the department of Communities and Local Government and a regular contributor to the BBC World Service.
Simon Keyes, Director of St Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace.
"Coming to St Ethelburga's was a surprise after years of working in the fields of homelessness, mental health and crime prevention. Strangely, almost everything I've done seems to come in useful here one way or another. I love the scope St Ethelburga's offers to combine creativity and enterprise with meeting a quite extraordinary range of inspiring people."
Dr Andrew Smith, Scripture Union.
Dr Andrew Smith is the leader of Youth Encounter, a project which helps Christian young people live out their faith amongst Muslims, based in east Birmingham. Part of the project brings together young Christians and Muslims at events and residentials to build friendships and learn how to talk about their faith with one another. Andrew is also engaged in increasing amounts of lecturing and training for youth workers and church leaders done at the Youth Encounter Centre in Birmingham. His doctorate explored how evangelical churches can teach Christian teenagers to live out their faith in a multi-faith context.
Dr Ute Kelly, Lecturer in Peace Studies, University of Bradford
Ute Kelly (formerly Bühler) is interested in the theory and practice of participation, deliberation and dialogue. Within this broad field, she has a particular interest in the potential of participatory/deliberative approaches in situations of conflict, diversity and inequality, and in the roles of both reason and emotion in shaping people's engagement with each other.
Apart from her academic publications, Ute has been involved with the Programme for a Peaceful City. As part of this involvement, she wrote a report on the concerns expressed at a discussion forum on the possibility of a 'Diversity Exchange' for Bradford (2002) and carried out evaluations of the pilot seminar for the new initiative of an Intercultural Leadership School for the Bradford District (May 2002) and of the Bradford-Keighley Youth Parliament’s first year (August 2003). She is hoping to continue to link her research interests with constructive engagement with the challenges faced by practitioners.

Introduction to Panel Discussion Series

A series of panel discussions examining the question of how to make intercultural dialogue work. Those working with intercultural and interreligious dialogue at the community or professional level face a range of challenges regarding its effectiveness. We are asked, or ask ourselves, such questions as:

Does what we do make or contribute to a tangible difference to society in any way?
Does our work, whether directly or otherwise, reach beyond the sympathetic to those whose attitudes and behaviour are an actual threat to peace and social cohesion?
Are the relationships that our work initiates across cultural or religious boundaries of a meaningful and lasting kind?
Is our work part of something broader that is capable of effecting change on a grand scale?

This series is intended to occasion focused and constructive discussion of such questions among a range of people concerned with relationships between different cultural, religious or social groups, in their professional lives or at the community level.

Findings and conclusions will be published. It is hoped that the series will be replicated at three independent UK branches of the Dialogue Society, allowing us to draw on a wider range of perspectives in collating findings.

Aims and Objectives

To encourage interprofessional dialogue, interaction and cooperation between people working on intercultural/ interreligious dialogue, peace and social cohesion.
To foster dialogue between people engaged with dialogue at the personal or community level, and those concerned with the same questions in a professional capacity.
To explore and clarify the questions of what effectiveness in dialogue is, and whether and how it can be measured.
To find a range of creative and practical answers to the question of how dialogue can be made effective by

identifying and promoting current best practice and
identifying and promoting promising future possibilities.
To share these answers among all participants of the series and more widely.

The Topics:

1. "Effectiveness" in Intercultural and Interfaith Dialogue: Can it be defined? How do we measure it?
30/11/2010
Confirmed speakers:

Mehri Niknam, MA, MBE, Executive Director, the Joseph Interfaith Foundation.
Simon Keyes, Director of St Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace.
Dr Andrew Smith, Scripture Union.

2. Effectiveness at the grassroots: seeking the personal and the genuine
07/12/2010
Confirmed speakers:

Imam Dr Abduljalil Sajid, Chairman, Muslim Council for Religious Harmony UK; Executive Member, World Congress of Faiths.
Samuel Klein, Co-Director, the Coexistence Trust
Sarah Perceval, Storyteller

3. Effectiveness in dialogue for conflict transformation
14/12/2010
Confirmed speakers:

Dr Diana Francis, Conflict Transformation Facilitator, Trainer and Consultant.
Dr Marwan Darweish, Senior Lecturer at Coventry, Expert in Peace Processes and Conflict Transformation.

4. Skills in dialogue: cultivating effective listening and empathy.
09/02/2011
Confirmed speakers:

Lisa Cumming, Programme for a Peaceful City, Bradford University Peace Studies Department
Justine Huxley, Interfaith Projects Coordinator, St Ethelburga’s Centre for Reconciliation and Peace
Jill Adam, Executive Director, Level Partnerships; previously Head of the School of Education and Professional Development at Leeds Metropolitan University.

5. Becoming a dialogue movement: what can dialogue learn from other movements?
02/03/2011
Confirmed speakers:

Danny Chivers, Performance Poet Involved in the Environmental Movement
Dr Nicola Montagna, Middlesex University

6. Preaching to the unconverted: how can dialogue reach the disengaged, the prejudiced and the hostile?
Confirmed speakers:

Stephen Shashoua, Director, Three Faiths Forum
Alison Seabrooke, Community Development Foundation
Prof Ian Linden, Director of Faiths Act, Tony Blair Faith Foundation / Professor of Religious Studies, SOAS
Canon David Porter, Canon Director for Reconciliation Ministry at Coventry Cathedral

Guests are warmly invited to attend as many of the sessions as possible to contribute to an ongoing process of focused reflection over the course of the series.