8 Summary of Week 6

In this week you’ve seen how an awareness of language use can assist in the role of the mediator. Katherine Graham is clear, however, that there is no clear-cut guide for the language of mediation: ‘When you train people [mediators], they’re always wanting a phrasebook and they’re very frustrated that you’re not going to give them one because the key skill is to be alive and creative in each conversation in each moment of each conversation.’ In a mediation, the professionals have to think on their feet, and use ‘what the parties bring’.

If you’d like to read more about the role of a mediator, you could start with the following two websites, which look at workplace mediators and family mediators respectively:

ACAS (2022) Mediation at work: What mediation is and how it can help. Available at: https://www.acas.org.uk/ mediation.

National Careers Service, Family mediator. Available at: https://nationalcareers.service.gov.uk/ job-profiles/ family-mediator.