Young people and alcohol: culture, communication landscape and slow dialogue

This paper reflects on the three-year funded project conducted in 6 secondary schools in Edinburgh. The project used dialogue as an approach in a peer education intervention, reaching over 2000 pupils, that aimed to change the way in which young people navigate their way through the challenge of alcohol. The paper will discuss the structure, methods, and outcomes of this intervention but  will focus in particular on two aspects: firstly, reflection on the role of “communication landscape” for public health interventions and secondly, on pragmatics of dialogue, confronting some problematic  aspects of the practice of dialogue, such as to role of routine, juxtaposition of routine practice vs peak experiences in dialogue; the role of repeated dialogic engagements in building commitment to reflection and change, and the question about the need for direction in dialogic learning and reflection vs dialogic creativity.  The idea of slow dialogue is thus offered as a way of pointing to the role for the combination creative repetition and routine in fostering transformation, one of the defining feature of dialogue.

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Join us for a drink, after the seminar, at St Lucy’s

Bio:

Magda Pieczka is Reader in Public Relations at Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, where she currently leads the Centre Public Engagement and Dialogue and is a key member of Communication, Culture and Media Studies research centre.

She is an Editor of Public Relations Inquiry, past co-editor of the Journal of Communication Management, and has served on the editorial boards of Journal of Public Relations Research and Prism, an international online journal. She has written about public relations profession and professionals, professional knowledge and competencies, about dialogue in science policy and health interventions, and public engagement.

She is a frequent contributor to international conferences in the field.