exercise · all tools
Conversation Café
Small tables of 5–7 make sense of a profound or troubling theme through four rounds with a talking object: two rounds where each person speaks uninterrupted, an open conversation round, and a closing round of takeaways. Simple agreements (listen, suspend judgment, share the air) hold the space. Built for the conversations communities avoid.
- Chosen for hard themes (crisis, loss, division) — the format holds a lot, but hosts should know local support options when the theme is raw
Practical
- Time
- 45-75 min
- Group
- 5–∞ · small-group, large-group
- Settings
- in-person, online
- Materials
- Small tables of 5–7; talking object; agreements displayed
- Mechanisms
- dialogic-encounter, perspective-taking, stillness-silence
- Change scope
- state · repeatable
Instructions
- Where
- liberatingstructures.com/conversation-cafe — Liberating Structures, open
- Availability
- Open online — published at the link, free to read
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
Source link checked 29 Aug 2026 — unchanged since we recorded it on 28 Aug 2026
This directory describes and points home; the instructions stay with the people who made them.
Origin
Vicki Robin & Susan Partnow (Conversation Café movement); included in the LS repertoire with credit — Dialogue movement / Liberating Structures
In this directory via Liberating Structures
Related: Council (Circle with Talking Piece) (alternative-to)
status: checked · added 2026-08-25