You say you want a “revolution…?”

 

We’re real­ly excit­ed about TEDx Salem IV com­ing up on Jan­u­ary 7. The theme will be “Rev­o­lu­tions,” but what does that actu­al­ly mean? In today’s media, words like “rev­o­lu­tion” can be overused – Think “rev­o­lu­tion­ary” diets, inter­net busi­ness oppor­tu­ni­ties or dol­lar-shav­ing-kits by mail.

In the Mer­ri­am-Web­ster uni­verse, the word refers to the act of revolv­ing, or turn­ing on an axis. It also means polit­i­cal upheaval, like a change in gov­ern­ment, or “activ­i­ty or move­ment designed to effect fun­da­men­tal changes in the socioe­co­nom­ic con­di­tion.” On a per­son­al lev­el, it can also mean a “a sud­den, extreme or com­plete change in the way peo­ple live, work.”

Well, we believe this year’s speak­ers are going to turn some heads!

We’re going to learn about polit­i­cal rev­o­lu­tions, from resist­ing oppres­sion in Latvia dur­ing the last days of the Sovi­et Union, to the activism of Don’t Shoot Port­land.

We’re also going to chal­lenge our per­cep­tion of the world. How do we main­tain per­son­al, mean­ing­ful rela­tion­ships in a dig­i­tal world that pro­motes “likes” and “shares” over phys­i­cal inter­ac­tions? How do we fix the clin­i­cal tri­al process in order to get life-sav­ing drugs to the patients who are will­ing to try them?

Have you ever eat­en a crick­et? Would you, could you, with a friend, if it might mean a solu­tion to hunger?

And we’re going to see what it feels like to change a par­a­digm. We’ll meet a local artist and busi­ness own­er who didn’t accept area home­less­ness as a fact of life and in the process turned a Por­ta-Pot­ty into a “hap­pen­ing;” and a fresh­man in high school who wouldn’t accept that sit­ting at a desk is always going to be uncom­fort­able.

It’s all in keep­ing with the mis­sion of TED, accord­ing to TEDx Salem co-cura­tors Car­lee Wright and Bri­an Hart.

“We want­ed a [theme] that was famil­iar but dynam­ic,” Bri­an said, “sim­ple and pow­er­ful, a word that would evoke a strong emo­tion but could be inter­pret­ed many dif­fer­ent ways.”

“And with our event being at the begin­ning of Jan­u­ary, we had the idea of play­ing off the con­cept of New Year’s res­o­lu­tions,” said Car­lee.

“What’s your rev­o­lu­tion for the new year?”

“We want our audi­ence to come with an open mind and leave inspired,” Bri­an said, “to be think­ing about what they can do in their com­mu­ni­ty or how they can impact soci­ety.”

“TED is all about the biggest thinkers and doers com­ing togeth­er to spread the most impor­tant ideas to the world,” he said.

“What’s more rev­o­lu­tion­ary than that?”