Meet Our Speaker Alumni | Laurinda Thomas – The Myth About Libraries

Three days left to apply to be a 2017 speaker/performer!

Libraries are more than just books and silence. At TEDxWellington 2016, speaker Laurinda Thomas told us how libraries help us connect to our past, understand our present and look towards our future.

Tell us about TEDxWellington
Being involved in TEDxWellington was a hugely empowering experience, on so many levels – from the chance to share your idea right through to the feeling of stepping onto the stage in front of so many people.

What have you been up to since you were on the TEDxWellington stage?

I’ve since changed jobs into a role where I’ll have the opportunity to have many more of the kinds of conversations I advocated for in my talk.

I gained a bit of professional notoriety from my talk! Months later, people still tell me they saw my talk, and tell me about the impact it had on them. It opened up so many opportunities to have important and challenging conversations with people. Personally, I was left with a sense of being able to do almost anything I put my mind to.

What’s next for you?

I’ve been asked to be the opening keynote speaker for the 2017 conference of my professional association, the Library and Information Association of New Zealand Aotearoa (LIANZA), which is a huge honour.

What was your one takeaway from TEDxWellington?

There are so many brilliant people out there with great ideas doing creative work. It gives you faith in our collective ability to make the world a better place.


The countdown’s on – get your application in to be a speaker/performer at TEDxWellington 2017 by this Wednesday.