The 1930s in the United States were pretty bad for employment in all industries, and the theater was no exception. As part of Roosevelt's New Deal, the Works Progress Administration created a division called the Federal Theatre Project....

Watch. Dime. Develop. Powder. Pantry. Dirt. That's right, it's time for a dip into the random, because we're talking about the Dada theater that grew out of Symbolism, and the Surrealist theater that followed Dada. You'll learn about...

In the early 20th century United States, big melodramatic productions were on Broadway, and everywhere across the country. Which inevitably led to an Avant-Garde backlash. An interesting part of the backlash was Little Theater, a...

We're back! This year Mike Rugnetta is teaching you about theater and drama. Are you in drama club? Want to know about the history of theater? Maybe learn some theater history? Have a lot of fun? This is the series for you! Over the next...

Get ready for Russian modernism. Mike is teaching you about the playwrighting of Catherine the Great, Anton Chekhov's plays, the Moscow Art Theater, and the acting theories of Stanislavski. It's all very real, and very modern. From a...

Get ready to get weird. Mike Rugnetta teaches you about the Theater of the Absurd, a 1950s theatrical reaction to the dire world events of the 1940s. You'll learn about Jean Genet, Eugene Ionesco, Samuel Beckett, and the theatrical...

I don't mean it mean, but today we're going to be cruel. It's the fun-loving Theater of Cruelty, which was pioneered by the genius Antonin Artaud in France during the inter-war period in twentieth century. The Theater of Cruelty was...

Dreams can be scary, mystifying, and sometimes unnatural feeling experiences, but there's plenty about them that are perfectly ordinary. Here's a compilation of some things we know about dreams.

Paul Catchlove believes strongly in the power of reflection. Through every career he's held -- from priest to opera singer to senior management consultant -- he's benefitted from a habit of considering and analyzing his goals, needs and...

Confronting climate change makes for better cities and a better quality of life, says Heidi Sørensen, director of the climate agency for the city of Oslo, Norway. From construction sites without noise pollution to fully electric...

How do you raise kids to step outside of their comfort zones and unlock their inner potential? It all starts with helping them develop a resilient mindset. Mother and business owner Tameka Montgomery makes the case for cultivating an...

We all experience it: that desire to do something wrong just for the sake of it. Whether it's walking on manicured grass or sticking your finger in a friend's ice cream, psychologist Paul Bloom invites us to see the clever, creative and...

What if we could use the power of DNA to create a sustainable, circular economy? In a talk about breakthrough science, synthetic biologist Jason W. Chin describes his team's work rewriting the genetic blueprint of cells to create a...

Thomas Jefferson, founding father of the United States and primary author of the Declaration of Independence, was part of America's fight for freedom and equality. But in his personal life, he held over 600 people in slavery. Are his...

When human rights advocate Manu Peni returned to Papua New Guinea from abroad, he built a home for himself using modern techniques -- and promptly learned a harsh lesson on how the newest ideas aren't always the best ideas. Peni calls...

Imagine that your life began as one of the planet's first humans. After dying, you're reincarnated as the second human ever to live. You then return as the third person, the fourth, the fifth, and so on – living the lives of every human...

Conservation champion and TED Fellow Adjany Costa is on a mission to empower Indigenous communities. Instead of imposing pre-designed policy and plans on local people, she says, conservation efforts should center those who know the land...

Eighty percent of the world's biodiversity is within Indigenous territories, yet these communities often don't have a say when it comes to protecting the lands they inhabit. Environmental activist Jupta Itoewaki explains why Indigenous...

Nearly fifteen percent of the world's population lives with a disability, yet this massive chunk of humanity is still routinely excluded from opportunities. Sharing her experience growing up with an autistic sister, disability inclusion...

How do we make historically exclusive fields like classical music, fine arts or academic research more accessible to everyone? Education equalizer and violist Matthew Garcia thinks one way to remove barriers is to create free, virtual...

You are constantly becoming a new person, says journalist Shankar Vendantam. In a talk full of beautiful storytelling, he explains the profound impact of something he calls the "illusion of continuity" -- the belief that our future...

What does inclusive leadership look like? Artist and TED Fellow Constance Hockaday shares how the captain of a trans-Atlantic community raft taught her how to voice her hopes and desires, inspiring a vision of possibility for the future....

Nestled in the forests of Canada sits the world's longest beaver dam. This 850-meter-long structure is large enough to be seen in satellite imagery and has dramatically transformed the region, creating a pond containing 70 million liters...

Despite common belief, retirement takes more than financial planning. And while you may be beyond ready to go on permanent vacation, you also have to psychologically prepare for when the novelty wears off. Riley Moynes explains the four...