by Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, USA- Often described as a tired seamstress, no troublemaker, Parks was in fact a dedicated civil rights activist involved with the movement long before and after her historic action on the Montgomery bus.

by Caroline Heldman, TedX, USA - A leading advocate for spotlighting how the mainstream media contributes to the underrepresentation of women in positions of power and influence in America, Caroline Heldman offers straight talk and an often-startling look at the objectification of women in our society.

by Kavita Ramdas, Ted, USA- Investing in women can unlock infinite potential around the globe. But how can women walk the line between Western-style empowerment and traditional culture?

by Anita Sarkeesian, TEDx, USA - Anita Sarkeesian talks about online misogyny in the video game community, and her experience with harassment because of her work.

by Rebecca Walker, Guardian, UK - Author Rebecca Walker outlines a utopian vision of a world after capitalism underpinned by a moral and spiritual revolution.

by Gayle Tzemach Lemmo, TED, USA- Women aren’t micro--so why do they only get micro-loans? At TEDxWomen reporter Gayle Tzemach Lemmon argues that women running all types of firms-- from home businesses to major factories-- are the overlooked key to economic development.

by Anita Roddick, Big Picture TV, UK- The late Dame Anita Roddick looks at the origins of social responsibility in business and questions the integrity of what is now commonly known as Corporate Social Responsibility.

by Linda Melvern, France 24, France - A document revealing the existence of French missiles in the Rwandan army's arsenal raises new questions about who was behind the killing.

by Scilla Elworthy, TEDxExeter, UK - "We can organize to overcome oppression by opening our hearts as well as strengthening this incredible resolve."

by Isabel Allende,TED, USA - Novelist Isabel Allende writes stories of passion. Her novels and memoirs, including The House of the Spirits and Eva Luna, tell the stories of women and men who live with passionate commitment -- to love, to their world, to an ideal.

by Leymah Gbowee, TED, USA - Nobel Peace Prize winner Leymah Gbowee has two powerful stories to tell -- of her own life's transformation, and of the untapped potential of girls around the world. Can we transform the world by unlocking the greatness of girls?

by Maureen Palmer, CBC, Canada - From tiny tots strutting bikini-clad bodies in beauty pageants to companies marketing itty-bitty thongs and padded bras to 9-year olds, images of ever-younger sexualized girls have become commonplace. Add to that: ever-younger boys with 24-7 access to hard-core internet porn. Sext up KIDS exposes how growing up in a hyper-sexualized culture hurts our kids.

Jennifer Pahlka, TED, USA - Can government be run like the Internet, permissionless and open? Coder and activist Jennifer Pahlka believes it can -- and that apps, built quickly and cheaply, are a powerful new way to connect citizens to their governments -- and their neighbors.

by Sabrina Mahfouz, We Are Equals, UK - Are strip clubs ever glamorous places to work? Is pole dancing a harmless way to keep fit? Award winning poet Sabrina Mahfouz will get you talking about whether men and women are equals in 2012

by Yamini Deenadayalan, Tehelka, India - What the Berlusconi regime meant to artists and why women writers are not taken seriously by the critics all over the world.

by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, TED, USA - Filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy takes on a terrifying question: How does the Taliban convince children to become suicide bombers? Propaganda footage from a training camp is intercut with her interviews of young camp graduates. A shocking vision.

by Sheikha Al Mayassa, TED, USA - Sheikha Al Mayassa, a patron of artists, storytellers and filmmakers in Qatar, talks about how art and culture create a country's identity -- and allow every country to share its unique identity with the wider world. As she says: "We don't want to be all the same, but we do want to understand each other."

by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, TED, USA - Women aren’t micro--so why do they only get micro-loans? At TEDxWomen reporter Gayle Tzemach Lemmon argues that women running all types of firms-- from home businesses to major factories-- are the overlooked key to economic development.

by Rasha Dewedar, Common Ground, USA - In the wake of the Egyptian revolution, Egyptian women candidly discuss challenges the they face, the need for more political awareness and recommendations for what can be done to encourage change.

by Karen Tse, TED, USA - Political prisoners aren't the only ones being tortured -- the vast majority of judicial torture happens in ordinary cases, even in 'functioning' legal systems. Social activist Karen Tse shows how we can, and should, stand up and end the use of routine torture.

by Alicia Hayashi, Canada - The "Baby Storm" case is not necessarily as unusual as it was exposed in the media to be.

by Leslie Dodson, TED, USA - Real narratives are complicated: Africa isn’t a country, and it's not a disaster zone, says reporter and researcher Leslie Dodson. At TEDxBoulder, she calls for journalists, researchers and NGOs to stop representing entire continents as one big tragedy.

by Melissa Harris-Perry, Rachel Maddow Show, USA - Thanksgiving is unique in that it quite literally celebrates undocumented immigration!

by Natalie Warne, TED, USA - At 18, Natalie Warne’s work with the Invisible Children movement made her a hero for young activists. At TEDxTeen she uses her inspiring story to remind us that no one is too young to change the world.

by Jayati Ghosh, International Labor Organization, Switzerland - Professor Ghosh called for an urgent shift in economic policy to reduce inequality and address the needs and aspirations of working people.

by Aurore Cloe Dupuis, France 24, France - Protesters and NGOs marching in Nice on Tuesday ahead of the G20 summit in Cannes say growing anti-capitalist protest movements are a great cause for hope.

by Ekaterina Lushnikova, Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic - The Movement Against Illegal Immigration is just one of many nationalist organizations in Russia that spreads hatred toward minorities. In the region of Kirov, a secretive group called the Black Hawks is urging Muslims to stand up to the threat of extremist violence.

by Amy Lockwood, Ted, USA - HIV is a serious problem in the DR Congo, and aid agencies have flooded the country with free and cheap condoms. But few people are using them. Why? "Reformed marketer" Amy Lockwood offers a surprising answer that upends a traditional model of philanthropy.

by Tetyana Bohdanova, GlobalVoices, Netherlands - From June 17 to September 10, 2011, a group of talented youth submitted [en] their entries to a short film competition about gender called “Gene of Equality”. Participants had to produce 5-minute films in one of two categories: “5 minutes of gender equality” or “5 minutes on domestic violence prevention.” The competition is sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme and the European Union Delegation to Ukraine.

by Saskia Sassen, Guardian, UK - By robbing people of the opportunity to develop their own economies, imperialist powers risk reducing their constituents to children, says Saskia Sassen.

by Rebecca MacKinnon, TEDGlobal, USA - Rebecca MacKinnon describes the expanding struggle for freedom and control in cyberspace, and asks: How do we design the next phase of the Internet with accountability and freedom at its core, rather than control? She believes the internet is headed for a "Magna Carta" moment when citizens around the world demand that their governments protect free speech and their right to connection.

by Emma Batha and Natasha Elkington, Reuters, UK - Somalia's women's minister says why she thinks her country is worst in the world to be born female.

by Zoe Graham, CMFD, South Africa - The continuing effects of landmines in Mozambique told through the stories of four landmine victims: Celso, a 10 year old boy who stepped on a land mine two years ago; Augusto, a 72 year old man who has been left to fend for himself for the last 32 years and Rosa and Helena, who lost both legs and are both single mothers struggling to provide for their children.

by Jade Barker, France 24, France - Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the International Monetary Fund and once the French Socialists' best hope for a presidential victory in 2012, has become a party liability following his arrest in New York on sexual assault charges.

by Dr. Helen Caldicott, Reportaje Montreal, Canada - Sobering facts on the dangers of nuclear energy and warfare.

by Sara Nason and Em Magenta, Guardian, UK - Em Magenta and her family live offgrid in Findhorn Bay, Scotland. Here Em introduces their self-sufficient lifestyle and explains why light-footed life is important for survival.

By Hoda Abdel Hamid, AlJazeera, Libya - With their husbands, sons and brothers at the frontlines, the women of Benghazi are busy supporting them with meals and supplies, preparing thousands of sandwiches and warm meals daily.

by Naomi Klein, CNN, USA - Again and again, policymakers ignore mountains of evidence warning of catastrophe, opting instead to roll the dice and hope for the best.
There are all kinds of explanations for what drives this sort of short-term decision-making, with greed and hubris cited most frequently. Less discussed, but possibly more important, is the phenomenon that the people taking the risks often feel distinctly distant from, if not outright superior to, the people most endangered by their decisions.

by Suheir Hammad, TED, USA - "Do not fear what has blown up. If you must, fear the unexploded."

by Zeinab Badawi, BBC, UK - Human trafficking exists in almost every country on earth. As many as 27 million people are estimated to live in modern slavery. Can this problem be stopped?

by Suma Joson, Counter Currents, India - In 2006 Sterlite, a subsidiary of UK mining company Vedanta built a refinery in Niyamgiri Hills, Orissa, India. The toxic waste material from the refinery pollutes air, ground and water.

by Jody Williams, TED, USA - Nobel Peace laureate Jody Williams brings tough love to the dream of world peace, with her razor-sharp take on what "peace" really means, and a set of profound stories that zero in on the creative struggle -- and sacrifice -- of those who work for it.

Lama al-Sulaiman & Wajeha al-Huwaider, Al-Jazeera, UAE - King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is pushing forward with political and social reforms in his country, but do those changes go far enough?

by Priya Shrestha, Russian Times, Russia - In October 2010, facing similar struggles, Americans have shown very little passion compared to the fury displayed overseas, where Europeans are striving much harder to protect their pockets.

by Felicity Lawrence, Guardian, UK - Pineapple is the latest bargain offer in supermarkets, but the true cost is paid in the countries where it is produced.

by Esther Duflo, TED Talks, USA - Alleviating poverty is more guesswork than science, and lack of data on aid's impact raises questions about how to provide it.

by Horia El Hadad, Islam Channel News, UK - Amina Wadud, a university professor and so called female Imam from America comes to the United Kingdom to lead the country's first ever mixed gender congregation.

by Mara Schiavocampo, MSNBC, USA - Allowing mothers and their infants the ability to stay together during the mother's incarceration increases the likelihood that she will have a successful re-entry back into her community.

by Annie Leonard, The Story of Stuff, USA - How you get Americans to buy more than half a billion bottles of water every week when they can get it almost free from a tap.

by Maude Barlow, Ecological Options Network, USA - At Klimaforum 09 in Copenhagen Council of Canadians founder and Special UN Advisor on Water Maude Barlow talks about the planetary water crisis, the fight for the soul of the UN General Assembly and what to do about it.