TED Talks
Cristina Domenech: Poetry that frees the soul
"It's said that to be a poet, you have to go to hell and back." Cristina Domenech teaches writing at an Argentinian prison, and she tells the moving story of helping incarcerated people express themselves, understand themselves — and...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: Why Shakespeare loved iambic pentameter - David T. Freeman and Gregory Taylor
Shakespeare sometimes gets a bad rap in high schools for his complex plots and antiquated language. But a quick peek into the rhythm of his words reveals a poet deeply rooted in the way people spoke in his time - and still speak today....
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Do you speak monkey? The language of cotton-top tamarins - Anne Savage
The cotton-top tamarin is a very vocal monkey -- the species communicates using a sophisticated language of 38 distinct and grammatically structured calls! Anne Savage teaches a few of these chirps and whistles, taking us through a day...
TED Talks
Anne Curzan: What makes a word "real"?
One could argue that slang words like ‘hangry,’ ‘defriend’ and ‘adorkable’ fill crucial meaning gaps in the English language, even if they don't appear in the dictionary. After all, who actually decides which words make it into those...
TED Talks
TED: The giant leaps in language technology -- and who's left behind | Kalika Bali
Thousands of languages thrive across the globe, yet modern speech technology -- with all of its benefits -- supports just over a hundred. Computational linguist Kalika Bali dreams of a day when technology acts as a bridge instead of a...
SciShow
3 Great Minds We Lost in 2018
We welcomed new science and discoveries in 2018, but unfortunately, we also had to say goodbye to some important figures in the scientific community.
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The Nutritionist by Andrea Gibson
An animated interpretation of Andrea Gibson's poem "The Nutritionist"
TED Talks
Claire Wardle: How you can help transform the internet into a place of trust
How can we stop the spread of misleading, sometimes dangerous content while maintaining an internet with freedom of expression at its core? Misinformation expert Claire Wardle explores the new challenges of our polluted online...
TED Talks
TED: How teachers can help kids find their political voices | Sydney Chaffee
Social justice belongs in our schools, says educator Sydney Chaffee. In a bold talk, she shows how teaching students to engage in activism helps them build important academic and life skills -- and asks us to rethink how we can use...
TED Talks
TED: How to have better political conversations | Robb Willer
Robb Willer studies the forces that unite and divide us. As a social psychologist, he researches how moral values -- typically a source of division -- can also be used to bring people together. Willer shares compelling insights on how we...
TED Talks
How AI can help shatter barriers to equality | Jamila Gordon
Jamila Gordon believes in the power of human connection -- and artificial intelligence -- to help people who might otherwise be left behind. Telling the story of her own path from refugee to global tech executive, she shows how AI is...
TED Talks
TED: The history of human emotions | Tiffany Watt Smith
The words we use to describe our emotions affect how we feel, says historian Tiffany Watt Smith, and they've often changed (sometimes very dramatically) in response to new cultural expectations and ideas. Take nostalgia, for instance:...
TED Talks
Chris Bliss: Comedy is translation
Every act of communication is, in some way, an act of translation. Writer Chris Bliss talks about the way that great comedy can translate deep truths for a mass audience.
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: A brief history of plural words - John McWhorter
All it takes is a simple S to make most English words plural. But it hasn't always worked that way (and there are, of course, exceptions). John McWhorter looks back to the good old days when English was newly split from German -- and...
SciShow
SciShow Quiz Show with Phil Plait
Hank squares off against Crash Course Astronomy host Phil Plait in our special Valentine’s/Old Timey Medicine edition of SciShow Quiz Show!
SciShow
Want to Speak a Foreign Language Better? Have a Drink
Drinking could help you master the complexities of speaking a new language, and might actually help you memorize your flashcards!
SciShow
Why Do Some Words Sound So... Lumpy?
Some words just SOUND like the thing they refer to. But are these associations come from the specific culture we were raised in, or is there something more fundamental going on here?
SciShow
Terpenes: The Most Common Language in the World
The most popular language on earth isn't spoken, it's smelled. Those smells are made up of terpenes, a multipurpose class of chemical compounds.
TED-Ed
TED-ED: What "Orwellian" really means - Noah Tavlin
If you've watched the news or followed politics, chances are you've heard the term Orwellian thrown around in one context or another. But have you ever stopped to think about what it really means, or why it's used so often? Noah Tavlin...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats
An animated interpretation of William Butler Yeats's poem "The Second Coming"
TED Talks
TED: A mother and son united by love and art | Deborah Willis and Hank Willis Thomas
An art school professor once told Deborah Willis that she, as a woman, was taking a place from a good man -- but the storied photographer says she instead made a space for a good man, her son Hank Willis Thomas. In this moving talk, the...
SciShow
Does Your Cockatiel Have an Accent?
Dialects are a part of how we communicate, but it also turns out that many animals have dialects depending on what part of the world they live in.
TED-Ed
TED-ED: The left brain vs. right brain myth - Elizabeth Waters
The human brain is visibly split into a left and right side. This structure has inspired one of the most pervasive ideas about the brain: that the left side controls logic and the right side controls creativity. And yet, this is a myth,...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: The world's most mysterious book - Stephen Bax
Deep inside Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library lies a 240 page tome. Recently carbon dated to around 1420, its pages feature looping handwriting and hand drawn images seemingly stolen from a dream. It is called the Voynich...