Growing up as a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, Carson Smith, ’19, would gather with her family at her grandmother’s house to work through conflicts, equipped with food and Bible lessons important in their majority-Christian community. “Every spot would be taken on the couch by a different aunt or uncle or older cousin, with us younger cousins sitting on the floor,” Smith says.
One by one, the people present would share their view on the problem at hand. It was peacemaking, a mediatory approach to justice that draws on tribal practices. Unlike Western court systems, Smith says, peacemaking focuses not on assigning guilt but on restoring relationships and finding a solution amenable to all parties.
Once she settled in at Stanford, Smith began mediating peacemaking circles at the Native American Cultural Center. She later sat on the first university committee charged with recommending whether to rename campus landmarks honoring Junípero Serra, founder of California’s mission system. (In 2018–19, after the work of subsequent committees, the university’s main mall and two buildings were renamed.) In 2018, Smith received Stanford’s James W. Lyons Award for Service for her use of peacemaking in the community.
Now a third-year law student and a Knight-Hennessy scholar, Smith has brought her interest in conflict resolution into her research and teaching. She co-teaches an Indigenous peacemaking course for undergraduates, and in a forthcoming essay for the Stanford Law Review, she analyzes the use of bias response teams at universities to address discrimination complaints, ultimately recommending the teams be severed from punitive campus offices.
Next fall, she will begin a clerkship for Judge Sidney Thomas of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
“I still get a ton of requests to resolve conflicts,” Smith says, “and I often don’t have time to do them, because I’m trying to, like, pass classes.”
“Peacemaking circles are more than just a conflict resolution structure. They’re a way of living and interacting with people in your community.”
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“The role of the peacemaker is, like, you’re guiding the space and making sure that people are orderly, that the conversation spirals upwards—you’re moving in a positive direction—and that the comments and concerns of people in the circle are being reflected and not ignored each time you go around.
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“We pass a talking piece—like a talking stick, or an Aboriginal rain stick—that means something in our community. I’ve used everything: pens, pencils, mandarin oranges that turn into juice by the end of the conversation. It can have cultural significance and can be used as a reflective tool.
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“My dad’s side of the family is still very Christian, so often allusions to the gospel or prayer would be important in these conversations—a type of ceremony in its own way. I feel very much connected to the way I’ve seen my grandmother and my dad navigate conflict, heartbreak, sadness, grief, celebration, and community. I feel like I get to build off that in my own way here.
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“I have had situations in which people just get up and leave. Or if it’s something that’s traumatizing for folks, I have brought in therapists. Peacemaking takes a long time, and sometimes when a conversation gets explosive, we stop and say, ‘We’re going to come back next week and work on this.’
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“It does make my friendships a lot easier—with my family, friends, romantic partners—because you can be like, ‘OK, we’re going to work through this in a methodical way that isn’t exactly peacemaking but incorporates a lot of the elements.’ It becomes a life practice.”
Isaac Lozano, ’25, is a former editorial intern at Stanford. Email him at stanford.magazine@stanford.edu.
