Added: 1 year ago
From: TEDtalksDirector
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  • I like the way her mind works, I read most of her books when I was a soldier and her stories helped me get over that awful period....

  • elif şafak'ı çok beğeniyorum ve bütün kitaplarını okudum diyebilirim.konuşması,duruşu çok etkileyici ama keşke konuşurken düz bir tarzda konuşmasaydı.sanki bir yerden okuyormuş gibi konuşmuş buda biraz kötü olmuş:( Daha başarılı olması dileğiyle....Eleştiren arkadaşlarında ırk gözetmekten ziyade sanatına bakmasını tavsiye ediyorum ayrıca her kitabında farklı bir kurgu olduğunu söylemeden geçemiycem yani her kitabında farklı bir konu işliyor.Kimse bu konuda elif şafağı eleştiremez.

  • inspiring beautiful and attractive

  • Yes,. Good channel Video, Thanks for all Video.

  • You have a very informative channel.

  • ‎"Come, let us be friends for once; let us make life easy on us; let us be lovers and loved ones; the earth shall be left to no one."

  • @tortoisetrainer yes you saw the point :)

  • gerizekalı karı soyadını shafak yapınca küreselleştin demi.

  • i,in fact,love his perspective while reading her novels and many books.However,if i must say something about her is the fact that she brought discredit upon herself after book 'AŞK',like the books 'kağıt helva','firarperest'..Putting picture of herself on her books is not a good advertising idea..olmuyor olmuyor..btw i may take a liking to her just because of graduating from the same university..:)

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  • Just open your minds and listen to someone else's point of view...if it moves you-fine.If it doesn't-fine....I happen to have liked it.I wish she had not rushed so much through it,you need to digest as you take it all in. I admire her.It's a big world and Elif is an explorer.

  • @goodtuneman it indeed is a big world for you is it not honey

  • @kinalevi  what does that even mean?

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  • love the deepness... in her speech

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  • Living inbetween has become integral part of Turkish culture, because thwy experienced this 'crash' for more than two centuries.

  • she was created by someone, maybe you know that who are they..please just think that why another natinalist Turkish writers can not make any speech as like TED television or other international TVs?

  • I m surprised to see her on Ted. And even though I ve always found her very pretentious, this was a beautiful speech. There are a lot of people in Turkey, who live in the inbetween area, culturally. Not exactly European but not traditionally Turkish either. And to be a writer inbetween can be very frustrating. I was taught to write about what i know . This is very hard since what i know is mostly foreign culture but i m completely Turkish. Just like most of my generation. I ll take her advice..

  • not sincere and very plastic

  • Def linking peeps to this.

  • Wowwww....This is very nice speech...

  • that is such a lovely and constructive way of expressing the contemporary problems of the world...

  • I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH ELIF SHEFEK. REGARDS FROM AZERBAIJAN !!!

  • I love this woman! :)

  • Great Turkish woman!

  • booooring 

  • elif safak is an ignorant, she is an average writer, she always writes the same things. she is a kind of baloon which the islamic people like, that's all

  • she talks 100% sense.. amazing

  • @flyordie11

    seems you are ignorant

  • @ahmeteminkurtoglu how am i ignorant? she explained the turkish culture in a perfect way. there's the old school people who believe in things like black magic etc, while there's the european culture etc. listen to what she says carefully :)

  • She complains about the expectation of telling the poignant stories of the East and sounds as if she tries to fight against the imposed stereotypes of Western culture on the East. Sounds nice! But why on earth does she try to sell that 'spiritual east' image to the West? Isn't it stereotypically called 'orientalism'? So pretentious! So ridiculous! Who are you kidding with that memorized speech which is full of irrelevant made-up stories? Shame!

  • She is very smart and beautiful.I wonder if she likes beer and football.Mmmm beeeerrr and foootballl...

  • She is very smart and beautiful.I wonder if she likes beer and football.Mmmm beeeerrr and foootballl

  • marvelous

  • what is shafak??? which language is that?before learn to correct name of her, it's not SHAFAK, it's ŞAFAK , nobody can not change names of people. every name or surname has to been written correct. please respect language rules of all nations, as we do...

  • She is fantastic writer but I think she needs to put some souls on her stories..telling story like reading a book..!

  • telaffuzu kotu :S

  • she is not a native speaker, so it is so normal to have an accent. But is it the point? Is it what you guys get from this video?

  • :) cengizhan herkesin inancı kendisine:) ama çok güzel konuşuyor:) Yiğidi öldür hakkını yeme:)

  • Beni şaşırtıcak kadar iyi ıngilizce biliyor:)

  • @resmimutsuzluk Sen deli misin, bu kadin gavur sayilir :)

  • she is remarkable!

  • bad accent is ok, affected accent is not.

    an artist needs to have integrity, but bad literature is not art.

  • “Come, let us be friends for once; let us make life easy on us; let us be lovers and loved ones; the earth shall be left to no one.”

    Stories bring us together and connect us. She is using her stories to hug and to love all people. She is great. She has a brilliant mind. She is presenting Turkish culture in the best way. She is very successful with her own identity or characteristics.

  • @bilgicbaba I celebrate your presence in this discussion, and agree wholeheartedly.

  • @kaedenceSpeaks Thanks a lot for your complement......all i want just make a difference in people's mind about this speech.

    Also, you are different from others... Good luck in your life..

  • Wow... she's beautiful.

  • I always have a love-hate relationship with fiction. Her talk broadens my perspective. Makes me re-think my standpoint. Thank you.

  • A tough message softly delivered by this brave and calm lady..

    P.S. I cannot agree more about the difficulties on writing in another language, i wish more of the english-speaking people would have to do that :-)

  • Slow down, woman. 

  • This was a really good talk,she was right on so many levels! Very articulate and intelligent.

    .. Oh and for those who don't like "arty" TED talks don't watch just read the description if you have to!

  • Listening to this woman is better than drugs

  • @xcombatxevolvedx

    "It's hard to take her seriously with that stupid accent"

    Because we all know that native English speakers never have an accent... like from their dialect.

  • @xcombatxevolvedx thats not plastic surgery u fool..

  • She is an excellent speaker and storyteller.

  • Stunningly and gently radical :) I have long used both books and movies (all stories, really) as travel experiences. I must go read her stories!

  • A very similar sentiment has been expressed by Salman Rushdie in his essay, "'Commonwealth Literature' Does Not Exist" which is included in the book "Imaginary Homelands".

  • hot woman

  • @sirbata

    U never liked Turks but now u say thank you to a Turkish woman? Shows me how stupid u were.

  • Wow! As soon as the camera cut to her while she spoke, I just went wow! She's incredible.

  • As an Israeli... And much more than that: as a Person - I found this lecture beautiful, inspiring, exciting, and liberating.

    Thank you - For a wonderful half hour =)

  • The leason to take home from this for me is not can a non native english speaker write in english, but that stereotypes are bad, and as long as what you write is believable and intriguing no matter, who you are writing bout n what, it should be recognised based on the content n not who is writing it; n no a westerner writing a book is as good or bad as a easterner, as long as ideas interest please write

    peace

  • Interesting what she said about English-about there being a gap in between the mind and the tongue. This happens when we learn any foreign national language. Because grammar is never logical. Interestingly enough, this doesn't happen when people learn Esperanto, the neutral language. A study by a UN translator and linguist proved that the mathematical logic of Esperanto's grammar is pure genius. It helps speakers get comfortable with it within a few WEEKS of study. National langs take years.

  • @MiguelFerraz100

    He has a good command of English, German, French, Russian, Arabic and even Esperanto.

    他精通英语、德语、法语、俄语、阿拉伯语乃至世界语。

    I guess maybe 1-5% of the whole population can master the multilanguage, like the above example. As far as I know, I only knew real 3-5 Person who can speak or be perfect in Multilingual(more than 7 languages).

  • An inspiring, intelligent talk that she had obviously written and memorised in advance. The delivery somewhat detracted from the content, but it was still worth watching.

  • @Traffordsgoogle I think this was partly because she wasn't speaking in her native language, and she's still not comfortable in verbal english. That's why it sounds a bit memorized. Because she HAD to memorize it, otherwise, the right words wouldn't come out that easily during the talk. She had to make sure that she would say exactly what she wanted. Had she been talking in her native language, she probably wouldn't have had the need to memorize. :-)

  • @LachezarTsK I'm saddened to see that this misdirected comment has been so widely supported on this page. Leaving the exact quality and nature of the content aside, It is COMPLETELY unrelated to the phenomenal 20 minute  presentation given by this brilliant and humble artist. If that was all that any individual took for this presentation, I am saddened for their loss.

  • does anyone else think this? hatred is bred from prejudices and templates of people or things. I think you can dislike someone easily, but it takes a lot more to hate someone. i guess it's obviously good to have responsible writers with such ideologies than most people writing for NY times :P

  • Nice, but she speaks based on a construct full of metaphors. there's an effort to be open but her ideas don't inspire very much, or at least not me. it's like a concrete building of bricks and she's memorised every brick or , it's too artsy with a weak or oscillating storyline that waxes and wanes too much to be felt...

    But, it's a good thing that TED doesn't regulate the content of people's talks, then things would get too inorganic.

  • TED's worst talks - always on art.

  • very smart woman. not a single second wasted

  • VERY well said

  • Multicultural writers always stereotype westerners like this (for the Americans: I can make jokes ok?)

    btw, she said "Jewish" ohhh...

  • Brilliant! Loved her.

  • Great Talk!

  • Wonderful woman :)

  • What a cool woman. While her speech seemed a bit boring at times, she's probably right nontheless.

  • I like most of the TED talks, but this one was particularly unimpressive. It just struck me as a vague anecdotal hodgepodge both praising and condemning multiculturalism. It did not seem particularly original or relevant, and the speech itself was stiff and stilted, as if she were just reading right out of a book.

    I'm sure there are plenty who will disagree with me, if only because they think she, her accent, and her feel-good ramblings are so pleasant that nothing about her can be wrong.

  • @Scorpymhk

    No disrespect, but let me tell you one thing. If you come to Japan you'll see what it is like to live in a country where as soon as you do something different from others you are ridiculed, scolded and embarrassed to the point where you will have to change where you live, change your job and change yourself to someone you are not. It's not a harmony, it's a bunch of animals dieing slow "in the circle". What can change it? That's what she's talking about, from my point of view.

  • @TakumiSoldier I see what you mean. Perhaps my perspective is clouded by the fact that I have grown up in a diverse part of the US, where this kind of outlook is taken for granted. What you describe sounds like some pretty serious cultural hegemony and while I will not pretend to understand it, I can certainly see why her message would resonate for you. Even J.S. Mill argues that one should always entertain other viewpoints, to ensure that even the most valued truths are not held dogmatically.

  • That's a beautiful woman and who doesn't love that accent. Just an initial perception. Don't want to sound like a dick. I'm actually listening to the entire talk.

  • the intel advert at the end was good !

  • Great! so true, destruction brings us together, that answers my question on why God allows destruction xoxo.

  • great mind is great

  • Sorry love, but I switched off after the anecdote of your granny healing people with her divine-like powers.

  • @LAnonHubbard lol. You are a perfect example of what she was talking about

  • GORGEOUS WOMAN

  • watch?v=pXfaCNc_CDY&feature=re­lated

  • haha!i'd love to hear her give another talk on the FICTION OF POLITICS

  • "The Sufis say: 'Knowledge that takes you not beyond yourself is far worse than ignorance.'" ... ooooh I've been there, anchored into ignorance by knowledge.

  • Her english, as not her first language is better than many, if not most americans.

  • she is not only hot, she is intelligent, well spoken, has sense of humor, an artistic flair certainly, and seems quite spiritually mature. good person.

  • AMAZING. I had goosebumps. This is the most fluent speech I have ever listened. 20 minutes nonstop. And it was beautiful.

  • Wow. Absolutely amazing. Unfortunate that so many people missed the point in the comments, but also good that it resonated with so many also. As she said, stories lose their meaning when they become more than stories--and any belief we have is a type of story. When we're absolutely certain we're right and the other guy is wrong, we have ceased being meaningful human beings, and have become caricatures of ourselves. So for all you haters & cynics out there; lighten the heck up.

  • That was a very, very good TED talk! She speaks right out of my soul!

  • hahahahahahah I usualy dont watch the comercial at the end, but man that was great ROFL

  • incredibly beautiful and well spoken woman. Her speech was full of colourful quotes that were like plucking tasty plums off the branch- i wanted to savour them. Excellent upload.

  • The longer she talked the hotter she got, I really appreciate her experiences and point of view. All people who can write should be free to be creative and write whatever they long for and dream of. We are not bound by our nationality, color or gender when we imagine, and imagination is the language of our dreams, the root of all stories.

  • fuck she can talk

  • fiction liberates us when knowledge and artifice imprisons us.

  • Boo to all the cynical comments. Wonderful speech. It's nice to know there are human beings with souls still living on this planet.

  • @freethinker923 Someone gave an inspiring and well thought out speech layered with strong ideas, and all you could think of was the size of her pants? I honestly suggest that you replay this but close your eyes so you can digest the words instead of judge based on appearance.

  • @MysticZen guilty as charged.

  • i hate this sort of speech...uhhh! the magical power of circles! rationality is not an option in our modern plural society... no matter how good you write fiction...

  • OOOMMMG!

    totally agree with her idea, I keep a journal of dreams , but from time to time they spin off into some other stories, cool stuff.

  • Incredible story telling...

  • so impressive speech (l)

  • Never heard of Elif, beautiful person.

    Ill definitely find one of your books..

  • WONDERFUL!! SO WISE!

  • Utter crap.

    Remarkable in so far only as it is false, and true only in so far as it is unremarkable.

  • @dannyboyfour Don't sugar coat it, Dannyboy4, tell us what you really think.

    Anyway, I can see your point to a point. I am very annoyed when people write fiction about stuff they don't know. Almost all fiction writers do this, so it's true, unremarkable. On the other hand, I'm reminded of something Neil D. Tyson said about it being the first time he'd seen a black person asked an expertise question, not about race sports or entertainment. Stereotyping limits our conversations.

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  • Well done. Great points made.

  • this is one of my favourite TED talks evr

    er:

  • AMAZING! Her story would make a great movie.

  • BEAUTIFUL!!!!

  • Excellent! So poised and well spoken.

  • Speaking of fiction...efficacy of prayer and geomancy O_o, what a crock.

  • damn, she's an excellent story teller!!

  • She says, about the difficulty of acquiring another language (and stories from other lands, I feel), "...but if we manage not to be frightened by it, it's also stimulating." This is really the message of her talk - for those who can manage not to be too frightened by that which is different, then difference - of diet, of stories, of music, of art and culture - the exposure to difference can be wonderfully stimulating.

  • @friendinmiami Not diversity per se. She warns that classifications can turn into barriers, even with the best of intentions. You may find the unknown stimulating but you have to connect that back with our common humanity, instead of just taking a snapshot of it. Talk of 'diversity', even well-intentioned, preaches to the converted, and never challenges its intellectual opposite: 'nationalism'. Seeing our differences from that which bind us is much more transcendental.

  • Fantastic talk!

  • Need the "standing ovation" button over and over for this - what mastery she has, of so many aspects of life and literature!

  • @fauxman

    Yeah I thought so too! She's beautiful!

  • Absoutly GREAT ! :D

  • lovely

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  • Superstition sucks.

    But stories can be wonderful and powerful.

  • i have a feeling she has this rehearsed..she only stops once or twice to breath and switch to the next para...good content anywho wish she connected with the audience more!

  • @amxallxoestrogen yeah. I agree, this is, my only critique to her. Her speech sounded too much prepared, getting rid of "the feelings" and paying to much attention to her delivery than the content, which is a little bit contrary of what she was saying. But maybe this is the way she always had work on her talks.

    Probably my comments come from the "rational world". Being a scientist myself, we usually are pretty good improvising in academic environments (like a big chunk of the TED audience).

  • Did she have a point?

  • bravo! brilliant women! well spoken :)

  • Meh. Fiction doesn't unite...it divides just as much as anything else.

    For example, I'd probably NEVER read this lady's books...but if she were to write SCIENCE fiction, maybe we're in business.

    But then...would she be writing hard sci-fi or space opera? If she wrote licensed fiction for an established series, would it be Star Wars or Star Trek? Good guys win or bad guys win?

    Fiction divides, cuz we've all got tastes and preferences, and some defend their own to the death!

    Just sayin'...

  • @BionicDance You missed her point. She didnt say that fiction ''unites'' us. She said that our imagination allows us to be free from all group thinking and stereotypes that we grew up with.

  • @IC1101 I didn't MISS her point, I was addressing the PART of her point that most interested me.

  • @BionicDance hmm well we all have our different tastes in music and yet music unites us all..and fiction does unite us am not american..not even western but an arab and my fav books are of american/british authors..my sister reads iranian authors bestsellers book in which the iranian culture is depicted..whose to say there isnt a turkish science fiction writer out there who helps bridges the gaps between writings in his books? it does unite us somehow

  • @amxallxoestrogen Music unites us all?

    You've obviously never been the sole punk fan surrounded by people who prefer country music. Or the lone fan of bouncy-fun 80s pop surrounded by goths.

    Trust me, music does NOT unite us.

  • @BionicDance no trust me, music does...like i said am an arab but i listen to arabic music and a lot more english music because ive come across it and i like it! someone else from a different country might share the same music taste and we r brought closer because of this common aspect and it has infact happened..sure everyone has different tastes but to every taste theres followers coming from different cultures thus uniting..stop looking at everything from under the microscope!

  • @amxallxoestrogen So you could be brought closer to ONE GUY. Big deal.

    You could ALSO be driven further from somebody who truly detests the music you listen to.

    Peoples' tastes DIVIDE as much as they might unite, and you seem to refuse to see this potentially negative aspect.

  • @BionicDance It's a mild form of tribalism.

  • @BaileysBeads Indeed. And that certainly doesn't unite...it divides.

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  • @BionicDance #

    hmm no am sure theres a lot of beyonce lovers out there..i won't be driven away, personally anyway...i dont listen to country and metal music but i wont hate his choice for favoring nor will i fight him on it..now if we r taking similar tastes imagine how much closer we can get!

  • @amxallxoestrogen Fine; different tastes don't make you enemies.

    But what it ALSO doesn't do is unite you, and that's all that's necessary to prove this lady's premise wrong.

  • @BionicDance I think you missed it. What she's saying is that fiction can transcend identity politics. Sure there will always be people who like or dislike. But what she's saying is that the dividing lines will NOT be based on their identities.

  • @sugarkang No, I DIDN'T miss it...I DISAGREE with it.

    Our tastes in fiction are just one more thing that separates us, that divides us, and imagination does NOT free us from anything, except the prison of our bodies; our preferences in the real world WILL drive our taste in fiction, whether it's fiction we consume or fiction we create.

    Dividing lines are very MUCH based on our identities, on who we are as people; they couldn't not be! We are who we are, and fiction doesn't change that.

  • @BionicDance Actually I think it can. Fiction does allow for ideas, feelings and worldviews to transcend identity politics. E.g through Asimov and the context of robots I was introduced to concepts I would not have thought twice about when I was a young Greek boy. People who place so stringent rules to what they will consider, in my experience usually just stay away from fiction, and are pretty much irrelevant to this subject.

  • @Cafeeine I'm not saying fiction CAN'T unify. But it also CAN divide, and this chick doesn't seem to see or address it.

  • @BionicDance At least from your previous comments, I got that its people's inherent tribalism that divides, and that fiction is not immune to that. This isnt however what this talk is about, I think. Its about how fiction can transcend boundaries. Consider for example a Saudi Muslim writing a Star Wars fanfic, or A Chinese woman writing a Buffy novel, and these being read by their respective fandoms. How would they interpret the genres' conventions without becoming Mary sues?