Page 358 - Mike Ratner CC - WISR Complete Dissertation - v6

Five additional participant volunteers representing a White male, a White female, a participant

who attended both the first and second CC series, a first-time participant from the second set of

dialogues, and a facilitator from the second dialogue series were invited to complete a research

survey then a lengthy interview. The addition of the five perspectives strengthened the base of

information and data obtained from participant volunteers who were not sought out to round out

the data collection by seeking views that were either missing or minimally represented.

The original question guiding the dissertation research addressed understanding the aspects

of awareness within the experience and Metasphere of participants in dialogue while attending a

Community Conversation event. How does one speak to represent ‘their point of view’ particularly

when others are examining and observing them as tension or disagreements emerge? This question

is important when considering Community Conversations and civic deliberate dialogue as a tool

for helping communities of diverse backgrounds discuss and heal issues of bias, racial and ethnic

tension. PALAR and GT methods were used to sort and analyze the data in an approach to analysis

that moves from the specific to the conceptual, through a process of emergence and discovery

based on layers of understanding as additional interviews were completed and data was collected.

The interview data and resulting dimensions reflect the interactions and encounters among

group members within the dialogue space created by small gatherings of curious and committed

individuals who joined with ready facilitators to engage in delicate, and at times, tenuous

exchanges about race, racism and discrimination. Supplementing the data gathering with

dimensional analysis created in-depth understanding about the human interactions and the

interplay between participants and facilitators during periods of tension and conflict and

understanding about exchanges among members of the group. While the quotes from the

339