A TedxFulbright Talk by Kimberly Burge: 'Where Curiosity Stops'

Kimberly Burge made five appearances in New Mexico in April 2016 to discuss her book The Born Frees. Burge has spoken to audiences and has been a guest on broadcast media in many parts of the country about her experiences working with a group of girls on a writing project in Gugulethu, a black township about ten miles outside Cape Town. Her most recent discussion came via a TEDx event using the TED conference format in Washington, D.C. in June of this year.  Below is the YouTube video of Kimberly's Ted Talk and the text that came along with it.



People don't always question the curious reasons why a place or a community or individual lives have been overlooked or excluded. Kimberly Burge is a narrative journalist, a longtime activist, and a Fulbright Scholar to South Africa. She earned a bachelor of science in journalism at Bowling Green State University, a master of fine arts in nonfiction writing from George Mason University, and was a fellow in global religion reporting for the International Reporting Project at Johns Hopkins University.

A contributing writer for Sojourners magazine, she previously worked for twelve years at Bread for the World, a Washington-based advocacy organization combatting hunger and poverty in the United States and worldwide. In 2005, she accompanied 150 grassroots activists to the G-8 activities in Scotland, where an international mobilization organized by grassroots leaders, along with Bob Geldof and Bono, called on world leaders to increase efforts to fight poverty in Africa.

Kimberly has published feature stories, editorials and reviews on issues of culture, politics, global poverty and development, faith and public policy. Her articles include an account of Johnny Cash’s last public performance (“Johnny Cash Goes Home,” Sojourners, January 2004) and an award-winning profile of writer Anne Lamott (“Crooked Little Faith,” Sojourners, May-June 1999). She has spoken about the girls of Amazw’Entombi at “After Girl Power: What’s Next?” an an international girls’ studies conference hosted by the Centre for Women’s Studies at the University of York, U.K, and at “Culture, Creative Transformation, and Adversity,” a faculty seminar at Waterford Institute of Technology in Waterford, Ireland. In 2012, as Visiting Humanities Scholar, she led a creative writing workshop for 25 inmates at Cumberland Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Maryland. She was born in San Antonio, Texas; grew up in Blytheville, Arkansas, and Cincinnati; currently lives in Washington, DC; and returns to Cape Town every chance she gets. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community.