Theme: Identity

Identity is a fascinating and complex concept that explores the ideas of self and perception, action and thought, expression and interpretation, nature and nurture. We find ourselves asking the following questions when we think about identity:

Who are we? Who am I? Who will I be?

It is a concept that affects the way we conduct ourselves and interact with others. It shapes you and defines you; it is your own unique ID.

These unique IDs are made of our differences, our perfections and imperfections, and they give us our own personality and inner narrative. From the second we enter into the world, each new act, each new relationship, and each new experience becomes an integral part to what we know as our character, redefining who we are and who we choose to become.

TEDxVancouver 2015 will delve into ID and examine the consciousness of you, the image presented, and the perceptions of those who observe it. We’ll also be looking into who we are as Vancouver—as individuals and Vancouverites, and also as a collective city.

Welcome to your ID.

800 Griffiths Way
vancouver, British Columbia, V6B 6G1
Canada

Meditation

A meditation leader

Performance - Drums and Flag Dancers

Aboriginal Drummers and Flag Dancers

Performance - Modern Dance

Performance by Artists

Prevail

With a career spanning over two decades, Prevail has been blessed to travel around much of the world. In doing so, he has been presented with a platform from which to connect community. As co-frontman for Canadian music group Swollen Members, Prevail has been the recipient of four Juno, seven MuchMusic and numerous Western Canadian and Radio awards. In recent years, he has focused his sights on philanthropic work, mainly as an ambassador for a therapeutic charity: Music Heals. A combination of entrepreneurial projects, including PrevailPrevail.com, BloodType Media and Kitsilano Records have inspired Prevail to explore different mediums of art and communication. His hallmark style of storytelling is a celebration of foundational poetry blended through the rhythmic device of rap music. Prevail's continual admiration for art encourages him to watch, listen, and mostly learn. Tags: TED, TEDxVancouver, TEDxVancouver 2015, Vancouver, TEDx,

Queen and Dancers

Drag Queen and Dancers

Chin Injeti

Chin Injeti’s humility and optimism come naturally, partially due to taking nothing in life for granted, and partially through staging an amazing recovery from a crippling disease. Born Pranam Injeti in India, Chin contracted polio at an early age and was wheelchair-bound for most of his young life, moving to Canada at the age of five because of the country’s acclaimed national health system. Thanks to his devoted mother Ellen, who refused to accept the hand the disease dealt her son, Injeti eventually walked again. “Music is a universal language” says Injeti. “Everyone speaks it. Everyone feels something from it.” Truly, this notion has helped to guide the talented Canadian record producer along his life’s journey, from surviving polio as a young boy to winning Juno and Grammy Awards for his work producing international superstars like Eminem, Pink, and Drake. YouTube tags: TED, TEDxVancouver, TEDxVancouver 2015, Vancouver, TEDx, Rogers Arena,

Dan Eisenhardt

Getting a new piece of technology from the drawing board to mass adoption takes a lot of hard work. Dan Eisenhardt learned this lesson firsthand. As the co-founder of smart eyewear pioneer Recon Instruments, he brought the first consumer heads-up display to market in 2010. In doing so, he turned a technology once reserved for the military into an affordable solution for sports. In 2015, Recon was acquired by Intel. Today, as an executive in Intel’s New Devices Group, Dan continues to lead the Recon team and to play a pivotal role in the evolution of wearable devices. He believes that the next generation of wearable technology shows enormous promise to transform our lives in profound ways, but distinct challenges loom ahead, and not all of them are technical.

Dan Sutton

Dan Sutton believes that natural, sun-grown cultivation methods can enable a brighter future. In 2012, he took notice of the changing Canadian legislation around regulated cannabis, and began building a team of leading agricultural scientists. Together, they designed, built, and now operate a facility that produces the plant legally, distributing it through a subscription service for medicinal purposes. The entire operation is subject to intense regulation, and it is Dan’s business to know a lot about his product. The massive scope of cannabis cultivation today is a reality, legal or not. The world’s most profitable cash crop is being grown en masse in every state, province, and metropolitan city in North America. It is a decentralized, cellular, and multi-billion dollar black-market economy. A legal cannabis-cultivation industry with the potential to displace the dark market is emerging, and Dan believes it needs to leave the archaic bunker grow-op behind.

Duane Elverum

Esther Honig

In the spring of 2014, journalist Esther Honig embarked on an unconventional social experiment. She sent her image to 50 strangers around the world and asked that they use Photoshop to “make her beautiful.” The results sparked a worldwide conversation around beauty ideals and globalization before taking an unexpected twist. On June 24, 2014, the project went viral and was featured on Buzzfeed, TIME, The Atlantic, CNN International, Good Morning America, The Today Show and many other prominent media properties. It wasn’t long before her face had become a public domain, highjacked by marketers. In order to take back the narrative surrounding her project and her identity, she had to relinquish ownership, confront the criticisms and allow her project to take on a life of its own.

Garth Webb

In the spring of 2014, journalist Esther Honig embarked on an unconventional social experiment. She sent her image to 50 strangers around the world and asked that they use Photoshop to “make her beautiful.” The results sparked a worldwide conversation around beauty ideals and globalization before taking an unexpected twist. On June 24, 2014, the project went viral and was featured on Buzzfeed, TIME, The Atlantic, CNN International, Good Morning America, The Today Show and many other prominent media properties. It wasn’t long before her face had become a public domain, highjacked by marketers. In order to take back the narrative surrounding her project and her identity, she had to relinquish ownership, confront the criticisms and allow her project to take on a life of its own.

Ivan Coyote

Ivan Coyote is a seasoned stage performer and long-time road dog, who over the last 18 years has emerged as an audience favourite at storytelling, writers’, film, poetry, and folk music festivals from Anchorage to Amsterdam. With a generous heart, quick wit, and the finely-honed timing of a gifted raconteur, Ivan grapples with complex and intensely personal issues of gender identity, as well as topics such as family, class, social justice and queer liberation. These stories remind us of our own fallible and imperfect humanity while at the same time inspiring us to change the world

Jackie Huba

Jackie has spent most of her career challenging people to express the best in themselves and most recently, she has helped women build confidence, take risks, and live more fearlessly by harnessing the transformative art of drag. Feeling creatively stifled in her own life, Jackie discovered this power first hand by creating her own female drag character and performing on stage. Jackie is a Forbes.com contributor, and her work has frequently been featured in the media, such as the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, BusinessWeek, and Advertising Age. She is an 11-year veteran of IBM, a Penn State University graduate, a Pittsburgh Steelers fanatic, and a karaoke champion.

Janet Moore

Janet Moore and Duane Elverum are helping to create the cities of tomorrow. As co-founders and directors of CityStudio, they have developed an experimentation and innovation hub for the City of Vancouver where staff, experts and students from universities and colleges co-create projects and generate innovative solutions to the complex sustainability challenges that we face in cities today. These projects improve our city and enrich our neighbourhoods, making the city more livable, joyful and sustainable. In the past three years CityStudio has engaged 127 students in the Studio Program,1878 students in the Partner Course Network, 75 Faculty across six campuses, 40 City of Vancouver staff, and over 100 guests in dialogue and consultation. The program has encouraged participation from over 1500 people at community events and logged over 50,000 hours of training, projects and community action toward collaborative city building.

John Herdman

Head Coach of the Canadian Senior Women’s National Soccer Team, John Herdman quickly reshaped a squad that had lost its way into one that captured the hearts and minds of Canadians by winning a bronze medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics. Before joining the Canadian team, Herdman was head coach of the New Zealand Women’s National team from 2006 to 2011, leading his players to competition at Women’s World Cups in 2007 and 2011 and at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. He also held the position of New Zealand’s Director of Football Development, where he introduced changes that have revolutionized how soccer is organized and delivered with his award-winning “Whole of Football Plan.” He was nominated for the 2012 Coach of the Year Award by FIFA, the body governing soccer around the world. Herdman stresses the importance of developing a high-performance culture, learning to overcome adversity with grace, and the role of leaders to inspire trust, confidence and success

Kaitlyn Bristowe

From the small town of Leduc, Alberta to the global stage, Kaitlyn Bristowe boldly forged an identity as perhaps the most controversial yet accepted Bachelorette to date. Known for her unapologetic resoluteness and her knack for quirky comedy, Kaitlyn has steadily remained composed under media scrutiny. In the wake of a backlash of cyberbullying that resulted from her no-nonsense, expressive behaviour on the 11th season of The Bachelorette, she has emerged as an ambassador for self-acceptance. Her experience offers a unique perspective on the harsh reality of unscripted television.

Lara Boyd

Our knowledge of the brain is evolving at a breathtaking pace, and Dr. Lara Boyd is positioned at the cutting edge of these discoveries. In 2006, she was recruited by the University of British Columbia to become the Canada Research Chair in Neurobiology and Motor Learning. Since that time she has established the Brain Behaviour Lab, recruited and trained over 40 graduate students, published more than 80 papers and been awarded over $5 million in funding. Dr. Boyd’s efforts are leading to the development of novel, and more effective, therapeutics for individuals with brain damage, but they are also shedding light on broader applications. By learning new concepts, taking advantage of opportunities, and participating in new activities, you are physically changing who you are, and opening up a world of endless possibility.

Marcelino "Frost Flow" DaCosta

Professional street dancer, artist, educator and community engagement worker, Marcelino DaCosta (aka FrostFlow) shares knowledge of hip-hop Culture to bridge generations for unification and progress. As founder of the renowned “Ground illusionz” Hip-Hop Creative Collective, he has led his crew to win countless titles over the last 16 years, earning international respect as a dynamically progressive and passionate signature B-Boy artist. Along with his competitive experience, Frost has become a national ambassador and local leader of many grassroots public youth health initiatives across Canada including: The Word Project 2004, Behaviour Arts Fest 2009-14, R.H.Y.T.H.M. and Let Go Expo 2011, Share Our Spirit 2012-14, STORYTiME Japan 2015. He supports and represents world recognized organizations: UNITY Charity and BluePrint For Life as a program coordinator and senior staff member.

Marina Adshade

Economist Marina Adshade’s theories on the interplay of market forces in the matters of love and libido have brought her attention from around the globe. Using engaging research and economic analysis, and no small dose of humour, Adshade unlocks the mysteries behind our actions, thoughts and preferences regarding sexual relationships, gender, love and power. She is the author of Dollars and Sex: How Economics Influences Sex and Love. Dr. Adshade has spent the last 12 years teaching economics and engaging in original economic research. In 2008, she launched an undergraduate course titled Economics of Sex and Love, which invited her students to approach questions of sex and love through an economist’s lens. The class was an immediate hit with students and, by the time the first term started, had generated international media attention. She has a Ph.D. from Queen’s University and currently teaches economics at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia.

Matthew Williams

Matthew Williams is a firm believer in the power of sport to transform lives. He experienced it firsthand when he joined Special Olympics in the eighth grade. Williams has achieved a great deal in his decade with Special Olympics. He competed in the 2015 Special Olympics World Summer Games in basketball, where the first-ever Canadian basketball team to participate in a World Games finished fourth. He has also participated in track and field, swimming, floor hockey, and curling. Now 23 years old, Matthew has become a Special Olympics International Sargent Shriver Global Messenger and a member of the Special Olympics International Board of Directors, where he shares athletes’ perspectives with leaders of this global movement. YouTube tags: TED, TEDxVancouver, TEDxVancouver 2015, Vancouver, TEDx, Rogers Arena,

Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas

Influenced by both the tradition of Haida iconography and contemporary Asian visual culture, Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas has created an artistic practice that is celebrated for its vitality and originality. His work encompasses a variety of different art forms including large-scale public art projects, mixed media sculptures and canvases, re-purposed automobile parts, acrylics, watercolours, ink drawings, ceramics and illustrated publications. Exploring themes of identity, environmentalism and the human condition he uses art to communicate a world view that while particular to Haida Gwaii - his ancestral North Pacific archipelago - is also relevant to a contemporary and internationally-engaged audience. His work has been featured in public spaces, museums, galleries and private collections across North America, Europe Asia, Australia and the Middle East.

Mohamed Fahmy

Mohamed Fahmy has spent most of his career covering conflict zones and some of the most definitive global events that shape our world today. An award-winning Egyptian-Canadian journalist and author, he has reported for the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, Dubai TV, Al Hurra and CNN. He also spent two years working for the International Red Cross. His most recent post as the Egypt Bureau Chief of Al Jazeera International captured world attention when he was arrested in December 2013. He was incarcerated for over 400 days — including a month in solitary — alongside ISIS terrorists and some of the most hardened Jihadists in the Middle East. The Egyptian Government pardoned Mohamed in September 2015, clearing the way for his return to Canada and sending him down a path of reflection on this life-changing experience.

Riaz Meghji

Riaz is the co-host of the popular morning television show Breakfast Television. He has been with TEDxVancouver as the perennial host and keynote interviewer since 2012.

Sam Sullivan

Sam Sullivan is a former mayor of Vancouver.

Scott Jones

TV host, popculture writer, entertainment critic and digitalmedia thought leader since the early 90’s, Scott Jones never could escape his ultimate destiny, to be a distinguished voice for geeks and gamers around the world. As the co-host of EP Daily, Scott has a long history of talking about everything cool in the world of video games and digital media. Scott was busy living a healthy, active, and (mostly) normal life when a one-in-a-million medical nightmare changed his world. A difficult and unusual stroke forced him to reconsider who he was and what his entire life should be about. After a long and arduous road to recovery, he emerged a changed person with a unique perspective and attitude about his identity. His story offers a candid view on how to get more out of life while doing less.

Scott Larson

Scott works alongside a talented team to democratize the view of Earth from space, a powerful perspective that few have ever experienced. In addition to full-colour Ultra HD video and imagery captured from multiple satellites, including the International Space Station, his work is currently progressing the world’s first fully-integrated optical+radar constellation. This growing suite of cameras will deliver imagery, video and data to educators, developers, media outlets, and others. The platform API will be open source, allowing developers to access data for the creation of robust applications. From education and humanitarian aid to disaster relief and environmental monitoring, the possibilities for the platform and its data are virtually limitless.

Tom Waller

Tom Waller leads teams of inventors, engineers and scientists to build products and experiences through innovative, industry-disrupting activities and projects. He is the current head of the Whitespace™ Workshop, a unique in-house R&D lab at lululemon athletica, and the former Head of Aqualab, Speedo’s global R&D and innovation facility, where he led all Olympic projects for elite swimming as well as advanced product and material development. Tom also spent five years leading the consultancy arm of Progressive Sport Technologies, a spin-off from Loughborough University’s Sports Technology Institute in the United Kingdom, where his team served many of the world’s largest athletic brands and Great Britain’s Olympic organizations. As an ambassador for the Engineering and Physical Science Research Council, Waller has presented at the House of Commons, as well as at multiple industry conferences.