Let's talk about …

 

... TED, an organization devoted to spreading ideas.

Usually in the form of short but inspiring TED Talks, which only require between 5 and 20 minutes of your time.

If you prefer to read this article in Dutch, you can head over to this blog article.

 

Did you know that:

  • TED is an acronym of “Technology, Entertainment and Design”?
  • it began as a conference which was held for the first time in 1984?
  • today it covers almost all topics - from science to business to global issues - in more than 100 languages?
  • it has its own Youtube-channel?

 

Of course, the topic of books is also adressed.

Today I'll show you some of my favourite TED Talks about books.

Subtitles are available in several languages.

 

Don't you have a lot of time?
Here are two 5 minutes-talks:

Joshua Prager did a fun experiment and searched for wisdom from great writers on every year of life:

 


Old books become beautiful art pieces in the hands of Brian Dettmer:


 

 

If you've got a bit more time, then following talks from 10 till 20 minutes are definitely worth checking out!

In ascending order according to their length, you can choose between:

 

A trip around the world with Ann Morgan who read a book of every country in the world in a year's time and thus 'visited' 196 different countries: 


 

Discover what Jean-Baptiste Michel and Erez Lieberman Aiden learned from 5 million books!
Fyi: ngrams can now be found on:
https://books.google.com/ngrams#


 

Cartoonist Scott McCloud bends the presentation format into a cartoon-like experience, where colorful diversions whiz through childhood fascinations and imagined futures that our eyes can hear and touch: 


 

An interesting and humorous presentation by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie about 'the danger of a single story':


 

 

My all-time favourite is the TED Talk in which children's book author Mac Barnett enthusiastically and humorously describes the sense of wonder that I'm always seeking!

 


 

2 comments:

  1. Don't make me publish the same comment twice, Tau - I already posted my first impression on your Hebban blog, but I will tell you this: the presentation by Adichie was absolutely worth watching. Oh, and the one about the old books as art was stunning too. But not so stunning as Adichie, in every sense of the word. Keep digging, Tau!

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    Replies
    1. Thanks to your comment, I added the link to the Dutch version of this blog article, Bohse 😉
      Yes, even though they're not really comparable as they're handling totally different things, those presentations were both really good in their own way!

      There are so many ideas in my head and beautiful things I want to share with you all, but at the moment I'm a bit short of time.
      Nevertheless, I'm going to try to blog on a regular basis again here on World of Tau too.
      So not only in Dutch on Hebban anymore. Although sometimes it will be the same blog in both languages and posted at the same time.

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