Anand Giridharadas writes about people and cultures caught amid the great forces of our time.

Why you should listen

Anand Giridharadas is a writer. He is a New York Times columnist, writing the biweekly "Letter from America." He is the author, most recently, of The True American: Murder and Mercy in Texas, about a Muslim immigrant’s campaign to spare from Death Row the white supremacist who tried to kill him. In 2011 he published India Calling: An Intimate Portrait of a Nation's Remaking, about returning to the India his parents left.

Giridharadas's datelines include ItalyIndiaChinaDubaiNorway, Japan, HaitiBrazilColombiaNigeriaUruguay and the United States. He is an on-air contributor for NBC News and appears regularly on "Morning Joe." He has given talks on the main stage of TED and at Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, Yale, Princeton, the University of Michigan, the Aspen Institute, Summit at Sea, the Sydney Opera House, the United Nations, the Asia Society, PopTech and Google. He is a Henry Crown fellow  of the Aspen Institute. 

Giridharadas lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife, Priya Parker, and their son, Orion.

Anand Giridharadas’ TED talks

More news and ideas from Anand Giridharadas

Live from TEDSummit 2016

Letter to the other half: Anand Giridharadas at TEDSummit

June 30, 2016

Writer Anand Giridharadas has come to TEDSummit to share an open letter to his fellow citizens. Invited by curator Bruno Giussani to address the dismay and confusion many have felt in the week after the Brexit vote result in the UK, the American writer and journalist lays out a vision that is as honest as […]

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Live from TED

Life stories: A recap of the moving talks in Session 5 of TED2015

March 18, 2015

Life stories. Session 5 of TED2015 was dedicated to the kind of personal tales that would make for a great biopic. From the story of two Texans that calls into question what it means to be “American” to a talk from a tech pioneer who founded a software company for women in the 1960s, enjoy our recaps of these […]

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