The academic world has a way with words; or rather, it has a way of grinding up once-meaningful words into a fine paste of incomprehensible terminology. There are all sorts of "college words" kicking around out there, terms you rarely run into outside the bounds of a campus. My personal favorite of these, and Duke's particular addiction, is "dialogue."
Pardon the cliche, but if I had a quarter for every time I encountered the phrase "spark dialogue" in the past four years, then Warren Buffet would be chauffeuring my stretch limo right now. Dialogue and its attendant verbs (spark, enter into, initiate, etc.) are incredibly pervasive and equally empty; the last time I can recall running into it was just a few days ago, during Sexual Assault Prevention Week (which, predictably enough, was attempting to "spark dialogue" about sexual assault).
I'm still not sure exactly what dialogue is (a conversation? A fancy conversation?), but it's reached the point where I can sense it everywhere, lurking indistinct in my peripheral vision. It's entirely possible I'm in a dialogue right now without even knowing it.
Don't get me wrong, I've attended some fine events and activities that billed themselves, either explicitly or implicitly, as dialogues. If done well, it's possible to create a space for intelligent, participatory and revealing discussion, fancy or otherwise, which I suppose is what's meant by the d-word.
But here's the rub: at the end of the vast majority of such events, when the audience is all fired up, when we're all ready to go fight in the streets for whatever cause or issue we've just finished dialoging about, someone inevitably asks what's next; what do we do now? Ninety percent of the time, the first and often only answer given is to "keep the dialogue going."
This is especially true when it comes to race relations, the absolute darling of the University dialoging circuit. Again, I'm not disparaging the concept of talking about race in a participatory manner, or even the execution of the myriad of lectures, workshops, conferences, etc., on the subject. I just find the prescriptive element to be sorely lacking: dialogue does a great job describing the problems of racial interaction, segregation and bias, and a pretty poor job laying out what to do about any of that.
Yeah, I know that race is a real tricky topic, and I'm definitely not claiming you can sit through an hour and a half panel discussion and then close the book on talking about it. Sure, the conversation has to continue, the dialogue has to keep going, but is that it? Is that all we do?
If we just talk endlessly about race, is it possible that we're just treading and retreading the same ground, mashing racial issues into an intellectual morass that ultimately isn't very illuminating at all?
Frankly, I think the answer is yes. I've been here for four years, I've heard a lot of recycled dialogue on race and I've seen very little material difference in how students of different races interact. Discussion piled on discussion is a deeply dissatisfying solution. What's needed is a term that's often surprisingly lacking from the University vocabulary: action.
Dialogue and action are natural complements to each other; one ought to flow seamlessly out of the other, like the Planeteers linking power rings to summon Captain Planet. It's really basic problem-solving technique: you talk the issue over, collaborate on it, then come to some concrete next steps that can be taken, with the understanding that you'll need to talk again. For some reason, that last part of the sequence has gone completely haywire for us, so that we largely neglect doing in favor of limitless thinking and conversing.
What would "action+dialogue" on racial issues look like? On an individual level, there's already quite a few models in place. Center for Race Relations runs retreats like Common Ground that pretty much follow this format exactly, though it's questionable how well the progress made on retreats translates to change when everyone returns to the University. You can take the initiative yourself and go talk to a guy or girl of another race, although this approach always seemed kind of contrived to me ("hello, person of a different racial or ethnic group! I'm looking for friends of a different racial or ethnic group than me, and you happen to be conveniently located!").
If these recommendations sound pretty tepid, that's because, as usual, I don't really have any answers to give you. All I'm looking for is a shift in focus from "think-talk" to "think-talk-DO" when it comes to race. What we actually end up doing is honestly less important. For now, it might be best to do a whole bunch of things and see what sticks. All I know for sure is that we can do without another guest lecturer or interactive debate if it means co-sponsoring one more community service day or even a party that links students of different races.
And please, whatever you do, keep this article to yourself. The last thing I want is to be accused of sparking a dialogue.
Brian Kindle is a Trinity senior. His column runs every Friday.
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