What can American parents learn from how other cultures look at parenting? A look at child-rearing ideas in Japan, Norway, Spain -- and beyond. The crisis of American parenting, as anyone who has looked at the parenting section of a bookstore can attest, is that nobody knows what the hell they're doing. Yet despite this lack of confidence and a...

Why do so many people today experience parenthood like a kind of crisis? That's the question Jennifer Senior sets out to answer on the final day of TED2014. The parenting section of Barnes & Noble is packed with books for eco-friendly kids, gluten-free kids, science-minded kids. For Senior, those shelves don't seem helpful -- they see...

TED Prize winner Sarah Parcak has learned some key lessons about parenthood from her work as an archaeologist. At the same time, becoming a parent has given her new insights into what her work means. Parenthood is perhaps the most binary experience we go through -- there’s an "is not" and then there’s an "is." For a split moment during labor, y...

Photographer Eman Mohammed captures the daily lives of incarcerated women and their children at one of the United States’ rare residential parenting programs. Eman Mohammed was just 19 when she began covering her native Gaza for a Bethlehem-based news agency. She spent more than a dozen years navigating violence and gunfire -- and sexism and ha...

In Session 4 of TEDWomen 2019, we tackled some big taboos — divorce, menopause, political dissent — and met the extraordinary people on the front lines of breaking them. The event: TEDWomen 2019, Session 4: Taboo Breakers, hosted by Corey Hajim and Shoham Arad When and where: Thursday, December 5, 2019, 2:30pm PT, at La Quinta Resort &...

It's time to nominate someone for the 2015 TED Prize, a $1 million award to a visionary with a great big idea for creating change in the world. Through Monday, March 31, you can nominate a mentor, a hero, a co-worker, even yourself. TED is looking for someone who has not only a great wish, but a track record that suggests they could accompli...

Yes, the classic TEDTalk involves one speaker and a deck of slides. But when two speakers take the TED stage together, the effect is layered and dynamic. From playful banter to moments of shared struggle, two-speaker talks are never short on personality. Here are eight talks where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Sergey Brin ...

Do you think in pictures? These TED fans do -- and they capture their thoughts in an idiosyncratic mix of words and text that parallels the way their thoughts flow. Sharon Hwang posted this adorable video on Instagram, showing her thumbing through her notes from TED2014. She writes, "What an amazing week at TED! Leaving completely inspired, w...

Children could definitely give the adults in their lives some lessons in parenting. Here are a few, from writer Swati Lodha. This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from someone in the TED community; browse through all the posts here. In 2016, author and coach Swati Lod...

We live most of our lives wired and wound up, rarely pausing to relax or unplug from the daily grind. Our speakers in this session discuss the consequences of our ever-hectic lives, and remind us of the qualities we sometimes forget to foster. They include an author discussing why modern parenthood is out of whack, a leadership expert encourag...

"What we need right now is more women who are full of themselves," writes activist Glennon Doyle in her book Untamed. One thing that can hold them back: Unhelpful and unhealthy beliefs about being a mom. Every generation of parents receives a memo when they leave the hospital with their baby. My grandmothers’ memo: Here is the baby. Take...

In the day since the Boston Marathon was interrupted by two bomb blasts – which killed three and injured more than 170 – a meme has emerged online: “Look for the helpers.” The quote comes from Fred Rogers, who shared in his tome The Mister Rogers Parenting Book, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to m...

TED2013 has come to an end. Here, the final session -- about the doers and givers who never stop spreading their ideas. In session 12, these speakers shared their bold words and even bolder actions. And it all built to a riveting finale. Here, the speakers who appeared in this session. Click on their name for a recap of their talk: Sometimes...

At the end of 2010, a researcher named Brené Brown gave a talk at her local TEDx event, TEDxHouston. That talk, "The Power of Vulnerability," has since become a web-video phenomenon -- viewed and shared by millions of people, who write us to say that her words -- on shame, vulnerability and honesty -- moved them, inspired them, helped them mak...

The only way to get things done—set your eyes on the goal, tilt forward, start running, and build momentum. That is the wisdom behind the theme for TEDWomen 2015: Momentum. TEDWomen 2015 will be held May 27-29, 2015, in Monterey, California, and will bring together a community of thinkers, doers and dreamers from around the world to hear tal...

For the ninth session of TED2017, hosted by TED's Editorial Director Helen Walters and Curation Director Kelly Stoetzel, we look into ourselves with seven speakers who take on subjects ranging from parenting to social interaction and heartbreak, revealing nuggets of wisdom that just might help you lead a better, more fulfilled life. The l...

Welcome to"Dear Guy," TED's advice column from psychologist Guy Winch. Twice a month, he'll answer your questions about your relationships, your job (or jobs), your family (or families), your passions, fears and more. Please send your questions to dearguy@ted.com; to read his previous columns, go here. Dear Guy, I am a married woman in her e...

Architecture and microbiology may seem like an odd couple, but TED Senior Fellow Jessica Green would beg to differ. In today’s talk, she reveals what’s teeming all over the surfaces around us, and how it can help us build smarter, healthier buildings. As the founding director of the Biology in the Built Environment Center at the University of...

TED is coming to Broadway. And curious minds of all kinds are invited. “TED Talks Live” will bring six nights of talks to The Town Hall Theater in New York City’s Theater district this November. The program will focus on three topics: The Education Revolution, War & Peace and Science & Wonder. Each night will be a thought-provokin...

So what went down at TED on day two? Well, a lot, as it happens. As curator Chris Anderson commented rather tiredly later, "that was the most intense day of TED I can remember, ever." Here, a lightning round-up of some of the day's key moments. Edward Snowden trundles onto stage The first big surprise of the day when a small robot rolled...

TED2014 is our 30th-anniversary conference, and the speaker lineup is -- in a word -- thrilling. Speakers will touch on topics ranging from technology, entertainment, design and education to climate change, architecture, music, physics, parenting, typography, fireflies and the Golden Gate Bridge. Randall Munroe of xkcd will talk about his passio...

When it came time to name her new book, Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead, Brené harkened back to a speech that Teddy Roosevelt gave in 1910. In it, Roosevelt said: "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deed...

Simon Sinek begins his talk with the story of former U.S. Army Captain William D. Swenson. In 2009, Swenson was on an operation in Afghanistan, near the Pakistan border, when his column was ambushed. It was bad; many were injured. During this ambush, Swenson called for air support and ran through enemy fire to rescue the wounded. The moment ...

Just in time for the second season of TED Talks India, Bollywood actor, producer and series host Shah Rukh Khan selects 8 talks that have inspired him and tells us why. Nearly two years ago, TED launched its first-ever TV series in India: TED Talks India: Nayi Soch (New Thinking). Filmed in Hindi, hosted by actor and producer Shah Rukh Khan, an...

No, “humble narcissism” is not an oxymoron; it’s a combination of qualities that the best leaders and companies have. Organizational psychologist Adam Grant explains why. Who would you rather work for: a narcissistic leader or a humble leader? The answer is more complicated than you think. In a Fortune 100 company, researchers studied whe...

Cross-posted from TEDWomen curator Pat Mitchell's blog on the Huffington Post. When Hanna Rosin, the first speaker at the very first TEDWomen conference in 2010, delivered her talk she had titled “The End of Men,” she had only just begun the research for what became her bestselling 2012 book by the same name. And as the editors at ...

Marine biologist Stephen Palumbi picks 10 of his favorite underwater creatures. From the oldest living animal to the fastest food in the sea, they’re all pretty extreme. Marine biologist Stephen Palumbi (his new TEDxStanford Talk is The Extreme Life of the Sea) knows a lot about what goes on beneath the world’s waves. Palumbi is the director of...

Scott Drummond had been in the Air Force for eight years. It was 1994, and he was eligible to become a commissioned officer, the Air Force’s version of a manager. The average person gets the job after three interviews. Drummond interviewed 16 times over the next ten years before he got the job. Looking back at his career, Drummond -- now ...

Did you know that meerkats stay close to home, even as adults, so they can inherit territory when Mom dies? Or that North American red squirrel mothers gift real estate to their kids (complete with stockpiles of food)? Evolutionary biologist Barbara Natterson-Horowitz and writer Kathryn Bowers make the case for why parents -- animals and humans ...

At TED2012, Susan Cain asked us to stop the madness. That is: the group work madness. At offices and schools around the globe, the desire for collaboration has led to an onslaught of open floor plans and group projects where individuals aren’t given much space to think on their own. And this is a big problem, Cain explained, because a third to h...