Building bridges: Dialogue and interaction between teachers from divided communities involved in a shared education project

This chapter examines group talk between Catholic and Protestant teachers in Northern Ireland as they discuss their collaboration on a Shared Education project. Shared Education is an initiative which offers opportunities for teachers and pupils from different communities to engage with each other and to promote positive and harmonious group interaction across the divided society in Northern Ireland. The chapter discusses the historical, social and geopolitical context in which teachers represent themselves and how this informs their views on the role of (cross-cultural) educational initiatives. Using discourse analysis, we illustrate how the teachers’ dialogue evidences both a struggle with competing and contested cultural positions and world views. We discuss how an exposition of teacher dialogue can be used as a tool of reflection in consideration of how to progress shared education.