2024-03-11
36 分钟Stories are such a powerful human invention that even the fictional ones can feel completely true. Dina Nayeri is a writer of fiction and nonfiction whose work highlights just how influential the stories we tell can be – and what is at risk when the truth isn’t valued. Dina speaks from her experience as a storyteller and former refugee about the importance of shaping a society that is thoughtful about language, history, culture, and truth. Then, she suggests frameworks anyone can use to think critically about what they think they know -- and questions why certain stories are more likely to be believed. For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts
TED audio collective.
You'Re listening to how.
To be a better human.
I'm your host, Chris Duffy.
Who do you believe and why do you believe them?
They're relatively simple questions to ask, and yet figuring out and understanding your answers to them is incredibly complex work.
We've seen how crucial this is on a global level when it comes to things like widespread denial of climate change or vaccine conspiracy or so many other issues.
Questions of believability are often life or death when it comes to national policies around immigration, incarceration or war.
But theyre also personal questions, too, questions that get at the core of who we see ourselves as being and who we trust.
Todays guest, Dina Nayari, is the author of two nonfiction books, the ungrateful refugee and who gets believed.
Dina writes and speaks about these issues, and she thinks so deeply about our answers to them.
Were going to be talking with her about those answers today.
But first, heres a clip from Dinas TEd Talk, where she explains how she first came to this work.
So I was born in Iran just after a big revolution that changed the country into the islamic republic.
Before that, Iran had been secular.
And after the islamic republic came to power, there was a big war with Iraq.
So suddenly things were very dangerous.
My family were christian converts, and so it was especially dangerous for us.
And soon after, I guess when I was eight, we ran, we ran westward and we became refugees.
So, you know, when I had lived in Iran those eight years, I remember always thinking it felt as if the men never really listened, like really listened to women.