What Does Feminism Mean? 3 TED Talks That Explain It To You

We hear every day the question: “What does feminism actually mean?” According to Merriam-Webster, it’s “the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes” and “organized activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests.”

That’s a good elevator pitch, but it could use more perspective, more context. Over the years, there were more than a few TED Talks take up the subject of feminism from many angles. Here are just three, chosen from the more than 150 TEDWomen talks published on TED.com and the TED Archive YouTube channels so far. 

While being in 2020, we hope these talks can inform how we channel the new awareness and activism into strategic decisions for women’s rights. 

1. Hanna Rosin: New data on the rise of women

Back in 2010 when we held the very first TEDWomen event in Washington, DC, one of our presenters was journalist Hanna Rosin. At the time, she was working on a book that came out in 2012 titled The End of Men. Her talk focused on a particular aspect of her research: how women were outpacing men in important aspects of American life, without even really trying. For instance, she found that for every two men who get a college degree, three women will do the same. Women, for the first time that year, became the majority of the American workforce. “The 200,000-year period in which men have been top dog,” she said, “is truly coming to an end, believe it or not. 

2. Chinaka Hodge: “What Will You Tell Your Daughters?”

Poet, playwright, filmmaker and educator Chinaka Hodge uses her own life and experiences as the backbone of wildly creative, powerful works. In this incredible poem delivered before the 2016 election — that is perhaps even more stirring today given everything that has passed in 2020 — she asks the tough questions about a year that none of us will forget.

3. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: We should all be feminists

This TEDx talk started a worldwide conversation about feminism. In 2012 at TEDxEuston, writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie explains why everyone — men and women — should be feminists. She talks about how men and women go through life with different experiences that are gendered — and because of that, they often have trouble understanding how the other can’t see what seems so self-evident. It’s a point even more relevant in the wake of this year’s #MeToo movement. “That many men do not actively think about gender or notice gender is part of the problem of gender,” Nigozi Adichie says. “Gender matters. Men and women experience the world differently. Gender colors the way we experience the world. But we can change that.”