A lot of fights weren’t started because of David Hooker and Raytheon Rawls.

As mediators, both Hooker and Rawls have successfully helped resolve an array of conflicts all over the world.

The Institute for African American Studies is hosting a lecture entitled “A Mediator’s Work,” a conversation between Rawls and Hooker as a part of Black History Month.

Raytheon Rawls

Rawls and Hooker, both faculty at the University’s Fanning Institute, have mediated conflicts locally, nationally and internationally; and the lecture will highlight the work of a mediator and how mediation skills can be used in different conflicts in society.

“We want people to know that a process exists that people can learn and use to make real and significant positive changes in their world,” Rawls said. “Whether it is in schools, religious environments, home environments or communities, people can take the energy that conflict emits and use it for positive change.”

Hooker has worked in Senegal, Nigeria and Eastern Europe, among other conflict hot spots. He also is working in Mississippi with people wanting to do healing work around the murders of three civil rights workers in the ’60s. Rawls has worked in Kenya and Liberia around women’s issues in conflict resolution and has worked with many University departments to help resolve conflicts.

Organizers hope to show the everyday usefulness of conflict resolution.

“I would like [students] to take away an appreciation of the complexities of conflict resolution,” said Freda Scott Giles, interim director in the Institute for African American Studies. “And perhaps apply some of the ideas that Dr. Rawls [and Hooker] talk about to their own situations and to have a greater awareness of how difficult it is to reach an understanding when two different parties, or more, are in the conflict, even if you are from the same culture and speak the same language.”

Rawls, Hooker and Chris Carlson, a mediator in private practice, recently mediated the conflict of the Atlanta School Board and were widely credited with resolving interpersonal issues and supporting the governance team, Rawls said.

Students who attend the lecture can expect to hear more of a narrative about mediation as opposed to a list of statistics and facts. They can expect to get first-hand experiences of conflicts on a local as well as a global level.

“It’s really a conversation,” Rawls said. “[About] how we got started, why we think the work is important and some interesting stories about work we’ve done.”

“A MEDIATOR’S WORK“
Where: 407 Memorial Hall
When: 12:15 p.m.