When did we forget how to talk to each other properly? And how to think difficult things through, together? Or has this always been controversial, fraught, and sometimes even deadly?

The importance of honest, frank, respectful dialogue among citizens was a belief that Socrates lived and died for back in Ancient Greece. And for Dr Frisbee Sheffield – Associate Professor of Classics at Cambridge and Fellow of Downing College – it is a belief that needs to be re-examined and promoted today.

Her recent fellowship at CRASSH saw her bring Socrates and Plato alongside 20th century philosopher Hannah Arendt to ask ‘what’s so good about conversation?’

At a moment when the University itself was debating freedom of speech, and social media appears an increasingly toxic space, how can we restore the benefits of thoughtful disagreement and face to face discussion? And what might change if we did?

Learn More:

- Frisbee's page on the Faculty website: https://www.classics.cam.ac.uk/directory/dr-frisbee-c-c-sheffield

- Read more of Frisbee Sheffield's work on the ethics of conversation here: https://antigonejournal.com/2021/04/socrates-ethics-conversation/

- Listen to Frisbee Sheffield discussing Plato's dialogues and the death of Socrates with Melvyn Bragg on BBC Radio 4's In Our Time: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0011rzy

- Discover the work of Frisbee Sheffield's CRASSH colleague, Kübra Gümüşay, on conversation, language and freedom of speech in a contemporary context, which is mentioned in this episode: https://www.waterstones.com/book/speaking-and-being/kubra-gumusay/gesche-ipsen/9781788168496

Read more on the Hannah Arendt / Adolf Eichmann controversy here:

https://www.dissentmagazine.org/wp-content/files_mf/1390334198d9Ezra.pdf

And more on Arendt and Socrates here:

https://www.jstor.org/stable/23955554