Conversation Cafés are open, hosted conversations in cafés as well as conferences and classrooms — anywhere people gather to make sense of our world.
At a Conversation Café there is nothing to join, no homework, no agenda, just a simple process that helps to shift us from small talk to BIG talk, conversations that matter. It is a 90-minute hosted conversation, held in a public setting like a café, where anyone is welcome to join. A simple format helps people feel at ease and gives everyone who wants it a chance to speak — it’s also fine for people to simply listen.
Use Conversation Café when: You want participants to learn more about themselves, their community or an issue, and/or discover innovative solutions to problems.
Topics suited for this model: Nearly anything! It is particularly suited for exploring topics (e.g. community, love, death), or for processing events or issues, like instances of violence or other crises in a community.
Why we chose this model: This is an open-source, simple method, which allows for it to be adapted to whichever issue or topic is timely or desired. With training, libraries can run this kind of dialogue using minimal resources — which makes it particularly ideal for the smaller and rural libraries.
Visit the Conversation Cafe website
Learning Sessions
WEBINAR: "Libraries Transforming Communities: Conversation Cafe" (recorded May 23, 2018)
Resources
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THE TOOL |
WHAT IS IT? |
HOW CAN IT HELP? |
GET THE TOOL |
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Quick How-To Guide |
A guide for organizing a Conversation CafÈ - with all the key information for hosts. |
Helps organize a CafÈ quickly - with the nuts and bolts to invite and facilitate a CafÈ in a short time frame. Also a useful resource for others interested in learning how to organize cafes.
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The Complete Hosting Manual |
A manual for how to organize and facilitate Conversation Cafes. |
Helps provide a step-by-step guide for hosting Conversation Cafes. |
Get the Complete Hosting Manual
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Core Principles for Conversation Cafe |
An outline of the agreements and commitments hosts and participants make to one another when participating in a Cafe. |
Helps explain the principles behind the process and why they are important. |
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Location, Location |
A guide to selection a location for a Cafe. |
Helps organizers think through the selection of a location and what is needed to host a Cafe. |
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Additional Resources |
A webpage with all Conversation Cafe resources.
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Provides all existing resources for Conversation Cafe and additional links for resources on dialogue. |
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These resources are offered as part of Libraries Transforming Communities (LTC): Models for Change, an initiative of the American Library Association (ALA) and National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation (NCDD) that seeks to strengthen libraries' roles as core community leaders and agents of change. LTC: Models for Change is made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).
