Theme: Attitudes that renew

The theme of the first edition of TEDxVer-o-Peso was "Different ways of living". For the second edition we´ve decided to choose the theme "Attitudes that renew", as the second chapter of the journey of TEDx community in Belém. What is attitude? Why do we need to change things in our lives? To renew is a process of transformation that never stops - there is no ending! At our event we will explore all these questions bringing to Belém speakers that will walk through this path in terms of technology, entertainment, design, passion, dreams, time and much more. We will all look for different ways of renewing our attitudes in the name of transformation. What is this all about?

Belém
Brazil

Adriana Ramos

The associate executive secretary of Instituto Socioambiental – ISA (Socio-environmental Institute), based in Brasília, Adriana closely follows the course of the Brazilian public policies. An online activist of the noblest causes, married to someone born in the Amazon, with body and soul she dove into the diverse realities of the forest. She got to know its people, their deep wisdom and faced another truth: the arrogance with which our society regards indigenous people and those people from communities settled along the rivers. Adriana was the master of ceremonies of the TEDxVer-o-Peso event in 2011.

Débora Noal

She likes to say that she is “human, Brazilian and a wanderer by nature”. During the six years she was in college, she protested as a student for a more dignified health system. From 2005 to 2008 she worked as a psychologist and public health worker in the Brazilian Northeast region public health system. A member of Doctors Without Borders, in the last four years she has lived among “people from disasters” nationally and internationally, in wars, epidemics, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes and ethnic violence. She has witnessed pain and perversity on the American, Asian and African continents.

Fernanda Baumhardt

Her dream was to be an international correspondent for CNN in wars and conflicts. In 2005, under other job titles, she started to work for CNN International in London, and after that she headed to the United States. One day, at the apex of her career, she decided to heed the call in a “mission sense”. Happily, she changed the US for Malawi, a country in Africa whose name means, curiously, “rising sun”. Now she lives in Brazil and is in charge of Proplaneta, a video production company, and she travels around the world making participative videos in small communities.

Pedro Werneck

For many years he was a businessman and managed many companies, but in 1994, after getting to know closely the story of an incredible woman called Flordelis dos Santos, Pedro started to mobilize his brothers and groups of friends, so everyone began to support social entrepreneurs that were having a hard time. It was a no-way-back path. Today, Pedro is the president of Instituto da Criança (Child Institute), an NGO through which he keeps doing what he can for a better world.

Marlúcia Bonifácio Martins

Reseacher at the Emílio Goeldi Para State Museum, Marlúcia has a post-doctorate in ecology from University of Leeds, in England, and her research encompasses ecology, conservation and fauna management. On one of her many walks she found a small part of the forest that unfortunately nobody sees: the Amazon from Maranhão state. Today, she is one of the biggest names in the fight for this piece of the forest, as unknown as it is important as to our biodiversity.

Leandro Ramos

A journalist who studied at the University of Brasília (UNB), in the Brazilian Cerrado environment Leandro found out that what made him happy was the Amazon. He moved to Belém and realized that in the forest or wherever, what he really wants is to work for a better world. Today he is the Brazilian representative of All Out, an organization that fights for gender equality, independent of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Filipe Freitas

“Edu-communicator”, Felipe has a background in deep ecology, permaculture, biopsichology, biodance, photography and audio-visual direction. He lives in Rio, but he is the co-founder of the ecovillage Terra Una, in Minas Gerais. He is one of the instructors of the course Gaia Education, based on “out of the box” sustainability. His multidisciplinary knowledge, allied to sensibility, taught him the power of connection – with others, with the planet, but mainly with himself. How to heal the other without looking inside?

Rodrigo Fernandes

Regional director for Net Profit Brasil in Rio de Janeiro, a company specialized in corporation development based on personnel development, Rodrigo graduated from the University of São Paulo, is an MBA professor and coaches professional people in different areas of knowledge. His specialty (and his biggest challenge) is to help people to realize what they want in life and how to get there. For him, success is the consequence of happiness – and not the opposite.

Elizabete Rodrigues

It never seemed impossible for this teacher from Laranjal do Jari to imagine students from a community in the countryside of Amapá state showing their project at an international Science fair in the United States. Beyond Physics and Math, the students that go to her classes learn how to dream big - even if to do so, people need to sell cakes in the square.

Felipe Cordeiro

Cheesy and tuned in, pop and alternative, local and global are labels confused all the time in the work of this singer and composer from Belém. Among the most influential musicians in the current Pará state scene, he might be the one most up for the challenge of producing innovative music while at the same time using traditional Amazonian culture, like the "guitarrada". Graduating in Philosophy, Felipe's poetry seems to have followed Caetano Veloso's advice in the song "Língua": "if you have an amazing idea, it's best to make a song".

Joaquim Melo Neto

Popular educator, community leader, founder of Palmas Bank, in Fortaleza, the first community bank in Brazil, coordinator of both Palmas Bank Institute and the Brazilian Chain of Community Banks - there are 103 in 19 Brazilian states -, Joaquim is also an advisor for programs and projects of solidarity economy in poor neighborhoods and cities. He has an astonishing sense of humor and of social entrepreneurship.

Marcos Arruda

Marcos literally suffered in his skin for saying what he thought. Exiled during the hard time of the military dictatorship, he became an economist and educator, with a masters degree from the American University and Federal Fluminense University. He is the general coordinator for the Alternative Politics Institute for the South Cone (Pacs) and he defends a new kind of economy based on love for one another and for the planet. Is that possible? He assures us it is.

Paulo Adario

He is at the head of Greenpeace's Amazon campaign, where he's been working for 14 years. His efforts resulted in the end of illegal mahogany wood commerce, the creation of different protected areas between Amazonas and Pará states, and an agreement signed in 2006 that ensures soy production doesn't cause deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Paulo was elected by Época magazine as one out of 100 most influential people in Brazil and, last year, he gained the UN title "hero of the forest". It is on behalf of the forest that he will talk at TEDxVer-o-Peso.