Podcast Summary: "How to love your hometown"

Podcast: TED Talks Daily
Episode: Sunday Pick: How to love your hometown (feat. Hanif Abdurraqib & Sarah Kay)
Original Air Date: November 23, 2025
Host: Elise Hu (introducing special episode from the TED Audio Collective’s How to Be a Better Human, hosted by Chris Duffy)
Guests: Hanif Abdurraqib (writer, poet, cultural critic), Sarah Kay (poet, educator)

Main Theme & Purpose

This episode explores the concept of "home"—how we define it, nurture our connection to it, and, above all, how loving our hometowns is interwoven with loving and caring for the people who compose our communities. Through the lens of Hanif Abdurraqib’s affection for Columbus, Ohio, the hosts discuss ideas of belonging, community-building, and the power of reinvesting in the places that shape us.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Meaning of Home and Belonging

• Personal Reflections: Elise Hu opens the episode grappling with the idea of home amid an increasingly "bigger, messier, and lonelier" world. She highlights the urgency of having people and places to call home. (04:17)
• Defining Home: Sarah Kay suggests visiting Hanif Abdurraqib in Columbus, Ohio to witness firsthand what it means to belong to and love a place. (04:43)

Grounding in Community

• Shared Experience During a Crisis:
  Hanif recounts a power outage during a city heat wave and how it transformed his neighborhood into a gathering point.
  • "A funny thing happens when you lose power...I peeked out my window and saw one of my neighbors gathering in a gazebo ... It was wonderful... everyone kind of like, we all don’t have power. What are the most immediate needs?" (06:05)
• Contrasts Individualism With Community:
  Hanif emphasizes that seeing oneself as a "small speck" in the universe can foster isolation, but witnessing one another’s lives creates connection.

Loving and Investing in a Place

• Everyday Connection:
  At Spoonful Records, Hanif describes how local shops build deeper ties.
  • "People just talk to me in a way that is also familiar and comfortable ..." (07:00)
  • "If I offer myself up freely and eagerly to others, it informs our interest in each other ... when we come across something that we think might delight the other person, we hold onto it for a while until they re-enter our lives again." (07:56)

Identity and Memory in Hometown Spaces

• Touring Columbus:
  Hanif shares favorite local haunts, such as Buckeye Donuts and Heat Archive (sneaker shop), emphasizing the community spirit in these spaces.
  • On Community at Heat Archive:
    -"If kids come in with a good report card, they'll give them a pair of sneakers for free. Or if a kid comes in and doesn't have enough money ... they'll, like, take care of them." (10:08)

The Dilemma of Leaving or Staying

• Contested Relationships:
  Hanif reflects on why some people leave or stay in their hometowns:
  • "Place is something that happens to you. What keeps me here? ... There is one woman on a street in East Columbus who has held onto her house no matter what ... her refusal, I think, is an action that my work is pointing towards." (10:50)

Place as Inspiration—Beyond the Cliché

• The Park of Roses and Poetic Inspiration:
  Hanif explains that natural beauty isn't necessarily direct poetic fuel for him.
  • "I don’t look at that bush of flowers and say, I’m gonna write a poem about that bush of flowers ... What is more useful to me is to find out the history of the flower and what it might tell me about the land it originally came from." (13:04)
  • Sarah Kay adds: "When something is already beautiful in the form that it’s in, it doesn’t need your messy human poetry traipsing about." (13:47)

Building and Sustaining Community

• Celebrating Each Other:
  At a poetry reading for Sarah Kay’s new book, Hanif reflects on the importance of "paying deep and close attention" to both the familiar and the people around us—how this empathy fuels community.
  • "If you can pay deep and close attention to the clouds that you walk underneath ... you might be able to pay close attention to someone in your life who may be hurting ..." (14:34)

Acts of Care—Small Gestures, Big Impact

• On Hospitality and Giving:
  Hanif shares a personal story about being unhoused and how a quiet act of inclusion—being let into a church to sleep—shaped his idea of community.
  • "It feels ... like this very simple thing of I have a key to something, I am going to unlock something, and we are going to sit in a place that feels comfortable and safe for as long as it takes. The miracle is to say I will surrender my time to you. And through the surrendering of my time, I hope to love you better." (16:48)

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Community During Crisis
  Hanif Abdurraqib (06:05):
  "It was wonderful... everyone kind of like, we all don’t have power. What are the most immediate needs?"

• On Making a Place Home
  Hanif Abdurraqib (07:00):
  "People just talk to me in a way that is also familiar and comfortable..."

• On Collective Generosity
  Hanif Abdurraqib (07:56):
  "If I offer myself up freely and eagerly to others, it informs our collective, our shared interest in each other..."

• On Community Hubs
  Hanif Abdurraqib at Heat Archive (10:08):
  "If kids come in with a good report card, they'll give them a pair of sneakers for free. Or if a kid comes in and doesn't have enough money for the pair that he wants, they'll, like, take care of them. It feels like as much of a community hub as a sneaker shop can be."

• On Staying
  Hanif Abdurraqib (10:50):
  "My very presence is stopping the worst designs of a city that has no idea who its population actually is. My staying here means I’m actually keeping a history that existed before me and a history that I want to exist after me."

• On Inspiration from Place
  Hanif Abdurraqib (13:04):
  "I tend to just kind of think that this is a cool place to sit in gratitude. Like, we're here. ...these flowers have survived a little bit longer than they normally would."

• Celebrating Sarah Kay’s Perspective
  Hanif Abdurraqib (14:34):
  "The entire project of Sarah Kay’s living... is look at this thing, look at this thing... I am checking to see if your heart’s still working and your ability to pay close attention to that which you have become intimately and deeply familiar with."

• On Acts of Care
  Hanif Abdurraqib (16:48):
  "I have a key to something, I am going to unlock something, and we are going to sit in a place that feels comfortable and safe for as long as it takes. ... The miracle is to say I will surrender my time to you. And through the surrendering of my time, I hope to love you better."

Noteworthy Timestamps

• [04:17] — Elise Hu opens with reflections on "home"
• [06:05] — Hanif recalls the power outage as a moment of neighborhood connection
• [07:00] — Hanif discusses why he loves Columbus (community, familiarity)
• [10:08] — Example of community care at Heat Archive sneaker shop
• [13:04] — Hanif and Sarah on poetic inspiration and natural beauty
• [14:34] — Hanif introduces Sarah Kay at her book event; focus on attentive love
• [16:48] — Hanif’s story about shelter and simple acts of inclusion

Tone & Takeaways

The tone is reflective, warmly intimate, and suffused with gratitude for everyday acts of generosity. The conversation draws on poetry, personal anecdotes, and hometown pride to illustrate how true love for a place is found in the relationships we cultivate, the histories we honor, and the time we willingly devote to caring for others.

Recommended for listeners who love:

• Reflections on identity, belonging, and place
• Community-building and mutual care
• Poetry, music, and storytelling rooted in the everyday
• The value of small gestures and local connection