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Biography

Laura Black is a group and organizational communication scholar who studies dialogue, deliberation, and conflict transformation. She received her Ph.D. in Communication at the University of Washington (Seattle) and was a professor at Ohio University for 17 years before joining Fielding as a Core Faculty in Organizational Development and Change.

Laura is fundamentally interested in strengthening democracy by helping people listen deeply, collaborate across lines of difference, make decisions deliberatively, and create inclusive organizations and communities. As an engaged scholar-practitioner, she designs and facilitates meetings using dialogue techniques and leads training sessions on conflict management, facilitating difficult conversations, and inclusive leadership. Most of her practitioner work has been with community or nonprofit organizations.

Laura’s research is anchored in theories of deliberative democracy and looks closely at the communicative dynamics of disagreement and dialogue across difference. She conducts qualitative, discourse-based research on both communication practices and the social structures that promote or inhibit dialogic collaboration. Her research includes studies of personal storytelling during deliberative discussion; communication practices facilitators and conflict mediators use to promote deep listening and engagement across difference; how facilitators deal with the emotion work of difficult moments; and how people can act as “deliberative catalysts” outside of specifically designed forums by communicating in ways that promote inclusive, respectful conversation about difficult topics in their everyday lives. She has numerous publications on these topics, is the past editor of the Journal of Deliberative Democracy, one of the founding officers of the National Communication Association’s Public Dialogue and Deliberation Division, and active in professional networks of deliberation and dialogue scholars/practitioners.