CEHV's Civil Discourse for Citizenship Program Director, Kathryn Joyce, was featured on the "When We Disagree" podcast, which uses personal narratives to explore deeper issues regarding arguments, conflicts, and disagreements. On this episode, titled "Challenging Authority," Joyce talks with Mike Lee, director of the Civility Initiative at the College of Charleston, about the challenges of engaging in civil discourse across differences in power and authority. Discussion of these challenges arise from Joyce's story about a disagreement she had with a professor as an undergraduate at the University of North Dakota. Joyce emphasizes the importance of accountability in relationships between professors and students, arguing that we should give college students the necessary tools and opportunities to hold their professors accountable, especially when questions of fairness arise. 

In the discussion, Joyce highlights CEHV's civil discourse programming and the 4Cs of civil discourse as tools for engaging in disagreements across differences, 

I think it's important that we are able to learn from one another and have conversations with people to see that they're human beings who have reasons for the positions they hold--and the reasons they have are not always the reasons we think they have. So, we should engage with people...especially those who disagree with us, in a shared inquiry to explore our disagreements. 

Joyce also talks about interpersonal obstacles to civil discourse

...exploring disagreement through civil discourse takes a lot of emotional management. If we feel ourselves getting angry and...defensive, it might be time for us to take a step back and ask if we can return to the conversation later. [You need] self-awarness of whether you are in a place where you're ready to explore [an issue] through civil discourse as opposed to just expressing emotions about the situation. I think that's an important thing for all of us to recognize: no matter how mature you are or how rational you are....we're emotional creatures and sometimes  we're going to have to...avoid conversations until we feel like we can handle them in the right sort of way. And that's okay. It's okay to be unprepared in the moment to have a conversation. 

Listen to the episode here.