By Carlos Cortés | Contributing Columnist
I’m not sure when I came up with the idea of composing conversations. But I did. Here’s how and why.
Since 2019 I’ve been writing a 1,000-word monthly column for the international ezine American Diversity Report, published in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The column is titled “Diversity and Speech.” This reflects my long-term research project on the turbulent historical intersection of the U.S. diversity movement and the American tradition of freedom of speech.
Although the column title spotlights the theme of speech, I actually range far and wide into multiple forms of expression. My column deals with all kinds of topics: privilege and hate speech; racial metaphors in sports writing and the controversy over transgender athletes; and my personal diversity experiences, such as navigating the N-word in various situations. My next ADR column addresses my sojourn as Consulting Humanist for The Cheech in Riverside.
Through my decades as a diversity consultant, I have had countless fascinating conversations with friends and colleagues about various facets of diversity, including its relationship to different forms of expression. Then, one day, it hit me: What if I could bottle some of those conversations? Or re-create them? Or re-envision them?
I started with my buddy Steve Petkas, a retired residential life administrator at the University of Maryland, College Park. For more than two decades I spent two weeks each fall in residence at Maryland, teaching classes, giving public lectures, and conducting diversity workshops. On Saturday afternoon of the connecting weekend I would camp out at Steve’s house to eat Chinese food, drink beer, and watch football games. And talk. As the years rolled by, one of our topics became the changing nature of college student speech, particularly when it came to diversity.
At first I considered jointly authoring an ADR column with Steve, but I soon decided that this wasn’t what I really wanted. Too often, jointly-authored articles end up like mini-versions of committee reports: muted strings of sometimes painful compromises that try to bridge differences in content, perspective, and style. Steve has a strong voice. I wanted to capture that unique voice so that it would come through clearly and authentically.
So instead of writing a draft of our article, I sent Steve a series of questions about college students and asked him to answer as briefly or extensively as he wanted. He obliged. Then I took his ideas, broke them into smaller segments, inserted my questions or comments that linked the segments, and modestly massaged his prose to make it seem as if he were responding to my interjections.
Once finished, I sent him the draft and asked him to revise it as he saw fit. Add new sections, if he wanted. Even change my questions. Back came Steve’s revision. Then mine. And so on. Each iteration sounded more like one of our football time-out conversations and less like a formal interview.
When Steve and I were both happy with the result, I sent the co-authored conversation to the American Diversity Report editor, indicating that I would like to use that conversation as my next column. She published the conversation and it was game on.
Since then such co-created conversations have become a regular part of my ADR column series. Not every month. I still enjoy probing certain topics on my own. But often I want to capture alternative voices in order to explore topics.
A conversation with Marjorie Graham-Howard about how she uses history to train psychologists about diversity at Azusa Pacific University. With Joseph Zolner, former director of the Harvard Summer Institutes for Higher Education, about the changing nature of training university administrators. (I was a Summer Institutes faculty member for nearly three decades.)
With Shannon Murphy about her experiences helping various audiences comprehend the neuroscience of diversity, the subject of her pioneering book. With Teri Gerent about her use of rock and roll music to teach high school U.S. history. With diversity and organizational consultant Angela Antenore about changing generational perspectives on gender. With my UCR colleague Joseph Kahne about exploring speech in the high school classroom in the pursuit of a more inclusive democracy.
Each co-authored conversation proved to be a unique writing experience. Different topics. Different personalities. Different writing styles. Different tolerances for formality and informality.
Each co-created conversation began with an acute case of stiffness and pedantry. But as drafts bounced back and forth — or we jointly edited drafts online — each interaction became more conversational. By the end, particularly as my co-authors and I massaged each others’ language and played with each others’ perspectives, each conversation ultimately acquired its own special voice.
Writing is hard work. But it can be more enjoyable when you experiment with new ways of presenting ideas.
Carlos Cortés is professor emeritus of history at UC Riverside, author of a memoir, “Rose Hill: An Intermarriage before Its Time,” and a book of poetry, “Fourth Quarter: Reflections of a Cranky Old Man,” and creative consultant for “Dora the Explorer” and “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.” He can be reached at carlos.cortes@ucr.edu.