TEDxSalem

Ideas worth spreading

2016 TEDxSalem

TEDxSalem entertainment fuses yoga, Broadway, Latin jazz, and Middle-Eastern folk dancing

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For those of you who have been to TED con­fer­ences in the past, you’ll know it’s more than just speak­ers (although they are cer­tain­ly a high­light!). It’s a whole day of inno­v­a­tive think­ing, engag­ing con­ver­sa­tion, mak­ing new friends, stretch­ing your brain, par­tic­i­pa­tion and enter­tain­ment. Beyond our ros­ter of speak­ers, we have break­out ses­sions and per­for­mances lined up to real­ly round out your day.

And if you’ve been to a TEDxSalem event before, you’ll know our enter­tain­ment always rocks.

This year is no dif­fer­ent. We have Mik­ki Trow­bridge teach­ing yoga; Ishtar Sumar with Iraqi folk danc­ing; Edna Vazquez per­form­ing folk, rock, pop and Mari­achi music; and a sur­prise per­for­mance from the folks at Enlight­ened The­atrics!

Mik­ki Trow­bridge

Mik­ki Trow­bridge has been teach­ing a flow­ing, vinyasa style of yoga since 2010. She received her 200 hour Yoga­Works cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in 2011 and also have com­plet­ed cer­ti­fi­ca­tions or advanced train­ings with Strala, Yoga Med­i­cine and Street Yoga. Her class­es are anatom­i­cal­ly informed and soul­ful­ly inspired and promise to be fun, flow­ing (often a lit­tle sweaty) and leave you feel­in’ good. She aspires to infuse her pas­sion for the prac­tice, her love of music and gen­uine, life-inspired mus­ings into each class.

Mik­ki teach­es pri­mar­i­ly in the Salem, Ore­gon area with stu­dio class­es at Indi­go Well­ness Cen­ter and pri­vate class­es at Ore­gon State Hos­pi­tal and at a vari­ety of local busi­ness­es and orga­ni­za­tions. In addi­tion, she hosts reg­u­lar Yoga + Beer events at local brew­eries around the state and offers StandUp Pad­dle Board Yoga class­es in Pacif­ic City.

Ishtar Sumar

Ishtar Sumar is an Iraqi folk dancer using move­ment to con­nect with cul­ture. She is a dance and fit­ness instruc­tor at Chemeke­ta Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege with expe­ri­ence in Mid­dle East­ern dance, as well as jazz, hip-hop and mod­ern dance plus health and fit­ness.

With cer­ti­fi­ca­tions and degrees in his­to­ry and sports fit­ness, Ishtar uses her danc­ing to teach move­ment and the his­to­ry of Mid­dle-East­ern folk dance. Ishtar is also the vice pres­i­dent of the Iraqi Cul­ture and Arts Asso­ci­a­tion in San Diego, as well as the chair of the Iraqi Jour­nal­ist Union in Amer­i­ca.

Edna Vazquez

Edna Vazquez is a Port­land-based Latin Amer­i­can singer-song­writer who per­forms orig­i­nal com­po­si­tions that pay homage to her inter­na­tion­al influ­ences with a pas­sion that comes through in every note of her music. She lifts the audience’s spir­its dur­ing her cathar­tic live per­for­mances with a vocal range that allows her to tran­si­tion seam­less­ly between folk, rock, pop and Mari­achi, all while explor­ing jazz stylings. Edna’s songs are deeply root­ed in uni­ver­sal human emo­tion and she has trav­eled far and wide spread­ing her mes­sage of light, love and cul­tur­al heal­ing.

Born in the Mex­i­can state of Col­i­ma but raised in Jalis­co, Edna spent half of her life immersed in the cul­ture and music of Mex­i­co and Latin Amer­i­ca, mov­ing to the Unit­ed States as a teenag­er. Her pas­sion for music and per­for­mance was born from these bicul­tur­al roots and has led her on a path of self-dis­cov­ery through song that has brought her suc­cess at each turn in the road. Whether shar­ing the stage with her musi­cal influ­ences or win­ning the first prize on Saba­do Gigante with her ren­di­tion of Cucur­ru­cucú Palo­ma, Edna’s spir­it and pow­er­ful vocal per­for­mance have been the cor­ner­stone of her career.

Enlight­ened The­atrics

Found­ed in 2013 by the­atre pro­fes­sion­al Vin­cen­zo Meduri, Enlight­ened The­atrics, a 501(c)(3) non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that aims to fur­ther the cul­tur­al enrich­ment of Salem by pro­vid­ing pro­fes­sion­al musi­cal the­atre expe­ri­ences and edu­ca­tion for all.

A Salem native and grad­u­ate of Sprague High School, Vin­cen­zo earned a Bach­e­lor of Fine Arts in Musi­cal The­atre from Elon Uni­ver­si­ty in 2011. Fol­low­ing grad­u­a­tion, he pur­sued his dreams in New York City dis­cov­er­ing a love for direct­ing and teach­ing, which inspired him to return to Salem to estab­lish an orga­ni­za­tion for artists, stu­dents and dream­ers ded­i­cat­ed to instill­ing hope, edu­ca­tion and inspi­ra­tion in gen­er­a­tions to come.

Enlight­ened The­atrics brings the Broad­way expe­ri­ence to Salem, while con­tin­u­ing to breathe new life into a rich, his­tor­i­cal insti­tu­tion at the cen­ter of the city’s cul­tur­al, social and eco­nom­ic evo­lu­tion.

In Jan­u­ary 2015, the Meduri fam­i­ly acquired Salem’s His­toric Grand The­atre. Con­struct­ed in 1900 and list­ed on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­toric Places, the the­ater has served as a sta­ple of Salem cul­tur­al life for more than a cen­tu­ry hous­ing and host­ing every­thing from per­form­ing arts to enter­tain­ment, retail, restau­rants and more.

It’s not too late! Get your tick­ets for TEDxSalem IV

Tick­ets are on sale now for Salem’s annu­al TEDx event Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 7, 2017. Tick­ets are $50, $40 for a stu­dent. You can also buy tick­ets at the door! The all-day event includes talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and a swag bag. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.us.

Vanessa Timmons: Resiliency throughout domestic violence, activism, survival and revolution

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Some­times, the word “rev­o­lu­tion” brings to mind a kind of vio­lence, the kind asso­ci­at­ed with wars and revolts and mas­sive upris­ings. But for oth­ers, the real rev­o­lu­tion­ary work is the work that goes into pre­vent­ing vio­lence — and help­ing its sur­vivors heal.

vaneesa2bOne such per­son is Vanes­sa Tim­mons, exec­u­tive direc­tor of the Ore­gon Coali­tion Against Domes­tic and Sex­u­al Vio­lence, a non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that works through­out the state to end vio­lence in all com­mu­ni­ties. Tim­mons is also a moth­er, a grand­moth­er, a sur­vivor of sex­u­al abuse, and one of the speak­ers at this year’s TEDxSalem.

“I real­ly see domes­tic vio­lence work as rev­o­lu­tion­ary work,” Tim­mons says. “Rev­o­lu­tion hap­pens in a com­mu­ni­ty when all indi­vid­u­als are able to thrive.”

For Tim­mons, the rev­o­lu­tion lies in the com­mu­ni­ty, not just in the indi­vid­ual. She sees heal­ing as a com­mu­ni­ty-wide action, not just some­thing that indi­vid­ual assault and vio­lence sur­vivors must do.

“My talk is focused on resilien­cy for activists and self-care as acts of rev­o­lu­tion,” she says. “It’s real­ly look­ing at how we sus­tain brav­ery and be engaged in rev­o­lu­tion­ary acts. How do we keep our brav­ery and resilien­cy and vision vig­or­ous­ly engaged while we’re in that effort of chang­ing the world.”

Tim­mons fur­ther explains that a lot of her work is char­ac­ter­ized as anti-vio­lence, anti-racism or anti-oppres­sion. But it’s also pro- work, too; it’s work­ing toward a bet­ter world for every­one.vanessatimmons

“The weari­ness of peo­ple as we’ve gone through this elec­tion cycle, in a lot of ways that weari­ness inhibits our abil­i­ty to sus­tain and main­tain our efforts,” she says. “I am real­ly hop­ing that peo­ple walk away from my talk with some prac­ti­cal skills that I use to sus­tain my own brav­ery and resilience in times of dif­fi­cul­ty.”

Get your tick­ets for TEDxSalem IV

Tick­ets are on sale now for Salem’s annu­al TEDx event Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 7, 2017. Tick­ets are $50, $40 for a stu­dent. The all-day event includes talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and a swag bag. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.us.

An ode to the annual event t‑shirt

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If you’ve been with TEDxSalem since the begin­ning, you’ve prob­a­bly noticed some­thing that occurred to me the oth­er day:

I’m build­ing up an impres­sive col­lec­tion of t‑shirts.

Not just reg­u­lar t‑shirts, obvi­ous­ly, but TEDxSalem offi­cial swag t‑shirts.

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We accu­mu­late t‑shirts all our lives. High school clubs, col­lege mas­cots, sum­mer camp uni­forms, fundrais­ers, fam­i­ly reunions, home­com­ing theme days, some­times even Hal­loween cos­tumes.

Some peo­ple purge these extra­ne­ous pieces of cloth­ing with clock-like reg­u­lar­i­ty. Oth­ers have decades of his­to­ry buried deep in their clos­et, unearthed in a wash of nos­tal­gia dur­ing a move or rig­or­ous spring clean­ing. I’ve known cer­tain crafty folks to stitch their shirt col­lec­tions into quilts; the ulti­mate trib­ute to mem­o­ry.

When I grad­u­at­ed from col­lege, I had enough spir­it­ed appar­el for at least two weeks of out­fits. I kept only a pair of sweat­pants and, of course, a cou­ple t‑shirts.

We’re now four years deep into the grow­ing TEDxSalem tra­di­tion, and we’re grow­ing the t‑shirt col­lec­tion that goes along with it.

There’s some kind of mag­ic with these shirts. Each event had its own swag out­side the shirt: Cof­fee mugs, bags, pens. But there’s a per­ma­nence to the sym­bol and the sto­ry you lit­er­al­ly wear on your back.

Maybe you wear them to oth­er TED events, to proud­ly rep­re­sent from where you came. Maybe you wear it to the gym or to sleep in.

With­out them, would you remem­ber the themes and logos of pri­or years? Would you still be able to trace the nar­ra­tive of an evolv­ing TEDxSalem, from new­born Illu­mi­na­tion to sopho­moric Mox­ie and swag­ger­ing Fear­less?

If last year’s Fear­less was our junior year, grow­ing in con­fi­dence but not quite estab­lished yet, then we come into senior year, tri­umphant, with Rev­o­lu­tions. Our vic­to­ry lap. Only, we aren’t fin­ished yet. Next year we’ll have anoth­er TEDxSalem, with anoth­er theme and anoth­er logo.

And anoth­er t‑shirt.

Get your tick­ets for TEDxSalem 2017

Tick­ets are on sale now for Salem’s annu­al TEDx event Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 7, 2017. Tick­ets are $50, $40 for stu­dents. The all-day event includes talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and a swag bag. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.us.

Revolutionary Summer Reading

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July 14, 2016 by Ste­fanie Knowl­ton

Aww! No TEDx Salem until Jan­u­ary? Don’t wor­ry, we have 10 books to get you ready for rev­o­lu­tion by win­ter.

TEDxSalem asked sto­ry­tellers and speak­ers to share their favorite read­ing based on this year’s theme: Rev­o­lu­tions. The beau­ty is that it can mean any­thing from a polit­i­cal upris­ing to rethink­ing pover­ty. Two read­ers rec­om­mend­ed books by an author renowned for spread­ing peace, a rev­o­lu­tion­ary idea indeed.

Check out their rec­om­men­da­tions, and feel free to share your own.

A hole in the flag1.  The Hole in the Flag: A Roman­ian Exile’s Sto­ry of Return and Rev­o­lu­tion by Andrei Codres­cu.

Codres­cu tracks his jour­ney as a self-exiled Roman­ian liv­ing in New York back to Roma­nia just days before the 1989 rev­o­lu­tion. Roma­ni­ans from all walks of life came togeth­er and top­pled the Ceause­cu regime. Codres­cu is wit­ty, artic­u­late, sen­si­tive and exam­ines not only how the rev­o­lu­tion hap­pened but how Roma­nia found itself in a state where rev­o­lu­tion was absolute­ly nec­es­sary.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem speak­er Gina Ochsner, an award-win­ning author and writer in res­i­dence at Cor­ban Uni­ver­si­ty

2. The Pover­ty Indus­try: The Exploita­tion of America’s Most Vul­ner­a­ble Cit­i­zens by Daniel L. Hatch­er

Hatch­er sug­gests that the prob­lems plagu­ing pro­grams such as fos­ter care and Med­ic­aid are deep­er and more trou­bling than most real­ize. Hatch­er, is also a pro­fes­sor at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Baltimore’s School of Law. In today’s protests for #Black­Lives­Mat­ter most activists focus on the root caus­es of pover­ty and state-sanc­tioned dis­crim­i­na­tion.  This book seems to sup­port sev­er­al the­o­ries and expe­ri­ences of those most vul­ner­a­ble lead­ers on the front line.
Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem speak­er Ter­es­sa Raiford, a con­tem­po­rary civ­il rights leader and com­mu­ni­ty orga­niz­er

 hunger games

3. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

It is a great dystopi­an sto­ry that blurs the lines of good guys and bad guys. It’s dis­turb­ing but also pret­ty real­is­tic in the sense that there’s a lot of nuance in the issues of our days. Even the peo­ple who appear to rep­re­sent you might have cyn­i­cal motives to attain pow­er. Also, Kat­niss Everdeen is a great, com­plex char­ac­ter who helps you under­stand post-trau­mat­ic stress.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem sto­ry­teller Saerom Yoo, an award-win­ning jour­nal­ist

 4. The Mind­ful­ness Rev­o­lu­tion: Lead­ing Psy­chol­o­gists, Sci­en­tists, Artists, and Med­i­ta­tion Teach­ers on the Pow­er of Mind­ful­ness in Dai­ly Life by Bar­ry Boyce

This is a col­lec­tion of essays on mind­ful­ness, explain­ing what it is as well as how and why we should prac­tice it in dai­ly life.

 5. The Art of Pow­er by Thich Nhat Hanh

This book does not men­tion rev­o­lu­tion, and yet it is about per­son­al pow­er and that is where the rev­o­lu­tion begins!

Num­ber 4 and 5 rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem speak­er Jer­ry Braza, For­mer pro­fes­sor, Bud­dhist teacher, author and con­sul­tant

 peace is every step6. Peace is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh

Some­times a rev­o­lu­tion doesn’t erupt in a crash of mor­tar fire or artillery shells. Some­times it’s the qui­et shift­ing of every­thing inside a sin­gle per­son. This book was that rev­o­lu­tion for me. It’s where I final­ly under­stood that peace doesn’t come from the absence of suf­fer­ing, but in the face of it. Zen mas­ter Thich Nhat Hanh shares sim­ple ways to prac­tice mind­ful­ness in every­day life.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem sto­ry­teller Ste­fanie Knowl­ton, award-win­ning jour­nal­ist and bel­ly­dancer

7. Loop of Jade by Sarah Howe

Sev­er­al crit­ics have sug­gest­ed that Howe is rev­o­lu­tion­iz­ing British poet­ry by includ­ing strong ele­ments from Chi­na (she has an Anglo-Chi­nese back­ground). The selec­tion of this book for the T.S. Eliot Prize ear­li­er this year has been chal­lenged by some in a male-dom­i­nat­ed estab­lish­ment. A num­ber of women (and men) have come to her defense in response. These gen­der dynam­ics, tloop of jadeoo, remind us of the rev­o­lu­tion with­in the lit­er­ary estab­lish­ment as more women join men as poets, crit­ics, and prizewin­ners as we gain more con­trol over our life choic­es.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem speak­er War­ren Bin­ford, Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor of Law at Willamette Uni­ver­si­ty, Direc­tor of the Clin­i­cal Law Pro­gram

 

 

 

8. The Book of Float­ing: Explor­ing the Pri­vate Sea by Michael Hutchi­son

I have bTEDxSalem book covereen inter­est­ed in sen­so­ry depri­va­tion tanks, (float­ing) for at least 5 years, but did­n’t try it until last fall just before my first 10-day silent med­i­ta­tion retreat. Float­ing takes away all of your sen­so­ry inputs and helps you focus your mind inward. When you’re float­ing in 800 to 1,000 pounds of Epsom salt and water that’s the same tem­per­a­ture as your body while in com­plete dark­ness, you quick­ly lose where you are in time and space. It sounds kind of woo woo, but it is tru­ly an amaz­ing and unique expe­ri­ence. This book talks about all the ben­e­fits float­ing has on your mind and body. It has a ton of sci­ence, too, so that helps legit­imize the woo-woo fac­tor. One float shop has opened in Salem this year and anoth­er is open­ing in August. It is def­i­nite­ly start­ing to become a rev­o­lu­tion!

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem co-cura­tor Bri­an Hart, half of the dynam­ic duo that brought TEDx to Salem

 

9. Jonathon Liv­ingston Seag­ull by Richard Bach

I believe that this book rev­o­lu­tion­izes the way we think. It encour­ages mankind to find a bet­ter world through knowl­edge. It teach­es us that it is impor­tant to pur­sue your pas­sion no mat­ter what, even if it makes you an out­cast. It is through this love of learn­ing and explo­ration that we reach enlight­en­ment and bet­ter under­stand who we are and what we are meant for. I rec­om­mend this book because it inspired me to think in dif­fer­ent ways to face the prob­lems I encounter.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem speak­er Megha Joshi, stu­dent and inven­tor

  1. The Art of Ask­ing: How I learned to Stop Wor­ry­ing and Let Peo­ple Help by Aman­da Palmer

Aart of AskingAman­da Palmer is an incred­i­ble, cre­ative per­son and her book is just a small look into the life of an artist. Snip­pets of music fills the space between chap­ters and sto­ries in the audio book, mak­ing this more than just a “read­ing” expe­ri­ence. I found myself wak­ing ear­ly for my morn­ing walk and los­ing myself rapt in her words. I felt like she was speak­ing to me, singing for me, play­ing at me. There were days my walks went extra long just because I did­n’t want the book to stop, and when it came to the end, there was almost a sad­ness that it was over because it tru­ly was one of those moments you just want to go on for­ev­er.

Rec­om­mend­ed by TEDxSalem co-cura­tor Car­lee Wright, the oth­er half of the dynam­ic duo that brought TEDx to Salem

 

Rev­o­lu­tion­ary Read­ing

1 The Hole in the Flag: A Roman­ian Exile’s Sto­ry of Return and Rev­o­lu­tion by Andrei Codres­cu 2. The Pover­ty Indus­try: The Exploita­tion of America’s Most Vul­ner­a­ble Cit­i­zens by Daniel L. Hatch­er

  1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
  2. The Mind­ful­ness Rev­o­lu­tion: Lead­ing Psy­chol­o­gists, Sci­en­tists, Artists, and Med­i­ta­tion Teach­ers on the Pow­er of Mind­ful­ness in Dai­ly Life by Bar­ry Boyce
  3. The Art of Pow­er by Thich Nhat Hanh
  4. Peace is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh
  5. Loop of Jadeby Sarah Howe
  6. The Book of Float­ing: Explor­ing the Pri­vate Sea by Michael Hutchi­son
  7. Jonathon Liv­ingston Seag­ull by Richard Bach
  8. The Art of Ask­ing: How I learned to Stop Wor­ry­ing and Let Peo­ple Help by Aman­da Palmer

TEDxSalem

TEDxSalem will be held Jan. 7, 2017 at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Dis­count­ed advance tick­ets go on sale Sun­day, Aug. 7, 2016. Reg­u­lar tick­et prices begin Aug. 21.. Watch the blog for details. E‑mail partners@tedxsalem.us to learn about spon­sor­ship oppor­tu­ni­ties or Mindie@tedxsalem.us to vol­un­teer.

What is TEDx

About TEDx, x = inde­pen­dent­ly orga­nized event

In the spir­it of ideas worth spread­ing, TEDx is a pro­gram of local, self-orga­nized events that bring peo­ple togeth­er to share a TED-like expe­ri­ence. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speak­ers com­bine to spark deep dis­cus­sion and con­nec­tion in a small group. These local, self-orga­nized events are brand­ed TEDx, where x = inde­pen­dent­ly orga­nized TED event. The TED Con­fer­ence pro­vides gen­er­al guid­ance for the TEDx pro­gram, but indi­vid­ual TEDx events are self-orga­nized. (Sub­ject to cer­tain rules and reg­u­la­tions.) 

 

Save the date! Our next annual event is…

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… Jan­u­ary 7, 2017!

Get it on the cal­en­dar now, because you’ll def­i­nite­ly want to be a part of this year’s expe­ri­ence.

We’ll be back at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter, which did such an amaz­ing job host­ing us last year, with new and improved plans for this year’s event.

We have a phe­nom­e­nal ros­ter of speak­ers, rep­re­sent­ing the absolute best of Salem, the Pacif­ic North­west and beyond. Look for more infor­ma­tion about them in the near future. But we can tell you that they include an Olympic ath­lete, a prodi­gy, a punk rock chemist, a Bud­dhist teacher and many, many more!

We have a brand new theme and incred­i­ble logo to go with it, cour­tesy of a local artist. Stay tuned for the full sto­ry behind why we’ve cho­sen Rev­o­lu­tions as this year’s theme, as well as the sto­ry behind the logo.

And speak­ing of artists, we have anoth­er Artist in Res­i­dence for this year’s event. You’ll hear more about her soon, but trust us, she’s a per­fect fit.

Ear­ly bird tick­ets will go on sale in August, so keep a look out for the for­mal announce­ment and get your tick­et while the get­ting’s good!

We are already so excit­ed for our next TEDxSalem, and we can’t wait to share all of it with you. Get ready!

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