What will Conversation Week 2007 be Like?
by Vicki Robin
Imagine a global conversation café. Imagine if everyone in the world asked the same question, at the same time, at Conversation Café tables around the world? Imagine everyone, everywhere being invited to select that most important question via a website voting method. Imagine hearing back from every conversation - what did you learn? What did you discover? What prejudices and blinders fell away? Imagine the world as Café, for just one week and then for a week a year and then every week, every year. A world in conversation.
Through the CC network, the outreach power of our OrangeBand partner (see article by Kai Degner, founder of OrangeBand), our web-partner, dropping knowledge (see Ian Manheimer's article about dk) and aligned dialogue organizations, CW2007 will reach out to many thousands of people globally, inviting them to help select THE questions, get trained to host a conversation, spread the word to friends, attend a conversation and celebrate their experiences post CW.
Conversation Week needs you! We need donations, hosts, participants and networkers. The Conversation Café method has been offered for five years free to anyone who sees this simple tool as a way to promote neighborliness, critical thinking, civility, democracy, wisdom, community and more. For Conversation Week to bring this method to many thousands more people, we invite you to help by donating generously this year. Your dollars will help train and support hundreds of hosts in many countries. Click here.
If you've been trained as a host - or trained yourself via the film and manual - you will be able to sign up to host a conversation in your locale. You'll receive (or can download) all the materials you need to make your conversation great. You'll be invited to a global kick-off conference call with the founders of the CW partners to feel the excitement of working together with at least 500 other hosts to create a global culture of conversation. People at your tables will feel the excitement of being one circle of hundreds worldwide engaging with most important questions of our times.
CW2007 is a big experiment in face-to-face-to-face conversation that's both intimate and global. It's a big experiment in cross cultural conversation in person and online - a shared learning experience. We intend to create the template this year for an annual Conversation Week that involves millions of people in BIG talk - a true global conversation that spawns many conversations throughout the year.
Why can't we all get along? Rodney King asked; Conversation Week 2007 invites you to join hosts around the world in inviting others into the kinds of conversations where diverse people do get along. In January you will begin to receive information and instruction about how to participate. For now, consider if you might be one of the 500 select hosts to participate in Conversation Week 2007. And please give generously to the CC Initiative this year.
What's an economy for? How can we heal the wounds of war? What have you learned for sure in your lifetime? These are some of the questions people have suggested as THE question. A set of 100 such questions will be on the Conversation Week website as of February for a global reviewing, rating and refining process that will surface the one - or perhaps five - question most on everyone's mind this year.
The Conversation Week template will also serve institutions, community groups, ngo's and more globally for any time a global crisis would benefit from turning into a global conversation. Imagine that!
For now, put CW2007 on your calendar. Consider donating generously to this major CC outreach effort. Polish up your hosting skills. Let's talk!
