Shorter Writings

Public writing

Essays and op-eds for general audiences on dialogue, polarization, and democratic life.

Why you should talk with people you disagree with about politics

The Conversation, 2024. Republished by outlets including the Chicago Sun-Times.

Six ways to encourage productive conversations on college campuses

The Conversation, 2024.

Working with the enemy: The pros and cons of collaborating with perpetrators

openGlobalRights / openDemocracy, 2017.

After ruptures between the police and communities, can words heal?

CNN, 2016.

What’s a funder to do?

openGlobalRights / openDemocracy, 2014.

Selected scholarly articles

Contested Speech in (Post)-Modernity: Understanding Debates About Political Dialogue on College Campuses

Teachers College Record, 2026.

Getting the world in view: What talk can do

Philosophy & Rhetoric, 2025.

Reasoning as questioning in dialogue

Educational Theory, 2024.

Dialogue and the good: Fingers pointing at the moon?

Studies in Philosophy and Education, 2023.

Agency: The constraint of instrumentality

Journal of Philosophy of Education, 2022.

Not monsters after all: How political deliberation can build moral communities amidst deep difference

Journal of Deliberative Democracy, 2021.

Learning in democracy: Deliberation and activism as forms of education

Studies in Philosophy and Education, 2020.

Just talk: Learning across political divides on college campuses

Theory and Research in Education, 2019.

The inner life of democracy: Learning in deliberation between the police and communities of color

Educational Theory, 2018.

No justice, no peace: The police, people of color, and the paradox of protecting human rights

Human Rights Quarterly, 2017.

Learning world culture or changing it? Human rights education and the police in India

Comparative Education Review, 2016.

Justice, context, and violence: How police explain torture

Law and Society Review, 2014.

A selection of peer-reviewed articles. A full list of publications is available on request.

Book chapters

Controversial conversations on college campuses: What happens and why it matters for democracy

in Teaching Controversy: The Politics and Ethics of Classroom Conflict, Oxford University Press, 2026.

Just Talking: Moral Recognition and Political Legitimacy

in The Necessity of Character, Finstock & Tew, 2024.

Dialogue in bad times

in Charlottesville 2017: The Legacy of Race and Inequity, University of Virginia Press, 2018.