Page 60 - Mike Ratner CC - WISR Complete Dissertation - v6

The positive aspect of Community Conversations innates the qualities of in-person civic

dialogue continuation as popular expressions of community engagement prevail, even as

advancements in information technologies make it easier for individuals to share ideas and emojis.

Notwithstanding the proliferation of online and virtual forms of communication, technology-based

and electronic methods of communication still exist, as Habermas (1989) termed, in a bourgeois

public sphere where an elite public of rational-critical perspective share and communicate. Virtual

and online dialogues occur even as a broader and more representative segment of the public is

excluded from digital forms of ‘influencer’ dialogue due to offline social and cultural conditions;

also termed the digital divide (Bonner, Carlitz, Gunn, Maak, & Ratliff, 2005; Dahlberg, 2001).

When people comment online about important topics, they offer the potential to engage in

a deliberative discussion, but they also may become uncivil to where we often hear about ‘trolling’

and other forms of harassment in the news from online activities. People must care deeply about a

topic to deliberate about it, but those strong feelings also may lead to uncivil speech when they are

confronted with a counter viewpoint. It is proposed that a conceptual model of how incivility and

deliberation—or at least “deliberative moments”—may co-occur in comment streams. As it is

upsetting some types of uncivil speech are so virulent that they prevent quality debate. However,

less severe forms of incivility may still allow for a vigorous discussion, rooted in reason, bolstered

by evidence, and open to disagreement. This dissertation proposes that we test this model.

A healthy democracy presupposes the ability of citizens to organize and discuss important

issues of the day, which affect the quality of life among individuals, neighbors, and those who

share common concerns. The reasons people gather in public I have found are wide and varied.

The impetus for dialogue and public discourse can relate to an issue that requires some degree of

collaborative effort between members of the public and government. Scholars of public dialogue

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