They've been called the "saints of Somalia." Doctor Hawa Abdi and her daughter Deqo Mohamed discuss their medical clinic in Somalia, where -- in the face of civil war and open oppression of women -- they've built a hospital, a school and a community of peace.(Recorded at TEDWomen, December 2010, in Washington, DC. Duration: 8:44) Watch Hawa A...

From the TEDx Tumblr, this inspiring story: TEDxMogadishu — the first TEDx event in Somalia — will happen tomorrow, May 17, and livestreamed around the world. Update: Read press reports from TEDxMogadishu >> On May 17, between 50 and 100 people from diverse backgrounds will attend the event to listen to Somalis discuss the reb...

In the image above, one million handmade bones -- made by schoolchildren and artists around the world -- have been methodically laid across the National Mall in Washington, DC, from the US Capitol building all the way to the Washington Monument. The culmination of a five-year project from TED Fellow Naomi Natale (read our interview with her abou...

Growing up in a small village in India’s Orissa region, Dilip Ratha dreamed of becoming a poet. With only $20 in his pocket, he crossed two oceans and moved to the United States to study and is now an economist at the World Bank. But he always saved up money to send back to his father and brother. His story is not unique. In fact, there a...

Beverly + Dereck Joubert: Conservationists and documentary filmmakers Beverly & Dereck Joubert focus on iconic cats, particularly the leopard. Heather + Tony Podesta: We like artwork where, when you close your eyes, you still see it. You see it in 4 minutes, in 4 hours. Hawa Abdi Dhiblawe + Deqo Mohamed: Somal...

Meet the new class of TEDGlobal 2017 Fellows! Representing 18 countries -- including, for the first time in our program, Somalia, Uruguay, Liberia and Zimbabwe -- this class clears a high bar of talent, creativity and eccentricity. Among those selected, you'll find a Somali computer scientist catalyzing the tech scene in Somalia and Somalila...

This weekend, thousands gathered in Washington, DC, to help lay one million handmade representations of human bones -- 1,018,260 bones, to be exact -- on the National Mall. This breathtaking installation created a haunting river of bones leading to the US Capitol, and represents the culmination of a nearly five-year social activism project imagi...

As I researched my book, Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here: Untold Stories from the Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism, and spoke with people in countries from Afghanistan to Mali, I discovered that just as the personal is political, the political is always personal. This has been the case in my own life as well, and it's why I made the decision t...

TIME Editor-at-Large Bobby Ghosh covers global affairs and the Middle East. For five years he served as the magazine's Baghdad bureau chief and, by the end of his tenure, was the longest serving print journalist in Iraq. Most recently Ghosh wrote a cover story on Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi, arguably the most important man in the Middle...

Could unemployment be a factor that leads to terrorism? In today's talk, peace strategist Mohamed Ali (not to be confused with the boxer) introduces us to the youth of Mogadishu, Somalia -- 70 percent of whom are unable to find jobs. In this talk, Ali highlights just how appealing the messages of terrorist organizations and gangs can be to t...

As a physician and epidemiologist, Gary Slutkin didn't think he had much to contribute to the conversation about gun violence in America. But then he began to realize something -- that outbreaks of violence follow the same patterns as outbreaks of tuberculosis, cholera and AIDS, all of which he'd worked on reversing during a decade in Somali...

Unmanned aerial vehicles -- that is, drones -- have a lot of people (and entire countries) hot under the collar. Every few days it seems a new report comes out about the death of another group of "faceless" people, whether it's suspected terrorist leaders or civilians. With little transparency from the governments launching drone strikes, th...

For four years, artist Naomi Natale’s social art practice, the One Million Bones project, has used education, hands-on artmaking and public art installation to raise awareness of ongoing genocide and mass atrocities. On June 8, Naomi and the One Million Bones team will be joined by thousands of volunteers to lay down the one million human “b...

“The politics of joy” is a phrase that resonates through this session of TED Fellows talks. These talks, by and large, come from people who’ve taken a hard look at the world and its problems and decided to engage joyfully, with creativity, fresh insight and heart. From a soccer project that empowers young refugees, to an SMS service for cow ...

Sam Richards, whose "Radical Experiment in Empathy" prompted a lively conversation all last week, sat in on TED Conversations today for two hours to answer questions about how to find empathy for people unlike us, and how we might prejudge someone -- even a TED speaker ... The conversation was thoughtful, honest and deeply optimistic. Thanks...

Among the winners of the 71st annual Peabody Awards: TED.com! The judges wrote: An outgrowth of a 1984 conference that brought together leaders in technology, entertainment and design (TED), the site makes creative thinkers and their ideas available everywhere, anytime. We're thrilled and honored to be among this company of Peabody awa...

If you ever find yourself in the northernmost town in the world, look carefully. Built into the side of a sandstone mountain is a glowing blue façade on top of a concrete tunnel; it might be the door to the secret headquarters of a Bond villain. And like Bond’s greatest villains, its purpose is at once deeply pessimistic and oddly hopeful. ...

TEDCity2.0 is a day-long TED event for urban innovators, organizers, stewards and builders--and it's happening right now, with a hub event taking place at the Times Center in New York City, and 138 self-organized TEDx events also being held in 48 countries, including Vietnam, Malawi, Mexico and Egypt. Here's what happened in the morning s...

This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from people in the TED community; browse through all the posts here. What’s your elephant in the room? Every group -- whether it’s a family or a team in the workplace -- has one: an uncomfortable, complicated or charged conversat...

Artists Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn rejuvenate neighborhoods around the world with color and collaboration through large-scale painting projects. Design duo Haas&Hahn -- Dutch artists Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn -- like to ask big questions (TED Talk: How painting can transform communities). For example, why should they use their brus...

In January 2011, Fred Villagomez, the head mechanical technician at a Mountain View-based satellite imaging startup, drove east, looping down and around the San Francisco Bay toward Fremont. His destination: an auto plant called NUMMI, a failed joint venture between General Motors and Toyota, whose assets were about to be auctioned off. Vill...

TEDx organizer Seema Raman has held three events in the past year, and traveled from her home in Bangalore to the snowy mountains of British Columbia to learn more about putting on great events. But the funny thing is: Raman never intended to organize anything at all. Raman, a 20-year-old engineering student at PES Institute of Technology...

We can do so with careful planning, recovering the ideals of compassion, peace and equity, and standing together in the face of hate, says Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. Life, down here on earth, is holy. It is also exceptionally fragile. It is hevel, a Hebrew word meaning a mere breath. Almost in his last words, Moses tells his people, “I call hea...

The world is more interconnected than ever before -- and the need to bridge political and ideological divides has never been more urgent. Now is the time to examine the rules of genuine human engagement, to find common ground for respectful, passionate discourse and to celebrate civility. That's the idea behind TED Salon: Up for Debate, a...

These precise re-creations of the world have the amazing ability to bring us up close to people and animals that are far away in space and time, says artist Aaron Delehanty. “I build time machines,” says artist Aaron Delehanty. Actually, his specific day job is constructing dioramas -- freeze-framed vignettes of animals and people in their habi...

Uganda is an eye-opening example of how displaced people can lift up a nation, say economics professor Paul Collier and refugee researcher Alexander Betts. Uganda hosts more than 500,000 refugees, making it the third-largest host country in Africa (after Ethiopia and Kenya). Its refugees come from a wide variety of unsettled neighboring countri...

Dan Visconti is updating the image of the classical composer -- from lone, fusty genius to dynamic community leader who creates music as a tool for social engagement. Whether he's telling the stories of Cleveland's refugee communities or composing a piece for the Mississippi State Prison, Visconti makes concert experiences that invite people...