| Summary: |
"In Can You Hear Me Now?, Celina Caesar-Chavannes digs deep into her immigrant childhood, her life as a young black woman entrepreneur and as a politician, revealing all the ways she wrestled with how to be her authentic self--and showing us how to be heard, loud and clear. Celina Caesar-Chavannes, already a breaker of boundaries as a black woman in business, got into politics because she wanted to make a bigger difference in the world. But when she became the first black person elected to represent the federal riding of Whitby, Ontario, she hadn't really thought about the fact that Ottawa hadn't been designed for a person like her. Determined not to be silenced by the constant micro-aggressions and racist assumptions of political life, Celina soon found herself both making waves and breaking down, confronting at night, alone in her Ottawa apartment, all the painful beauty of her immigrant childhood and her troubled early adult life. She felt the cost of speaking out, for sure, but also felt the exhilaration and empowerment, too. As she writes, "This is not your typical leadership book where the person is placed in a situation and miraculously comes up with the right response for the wicked problem. This is the story of me falling in love, at last, with who I am, and finding my voice in the unlikeliest of places." And it is both her memoir and a leadership book, a funny, self-aware, poignant, confessional and fierce look at how failing badly and screwing things up completely are truly more powerful lessons in how to conduct a life than extraordinary success. How they build an utter honesty with yourself and others that allows you to say things nobody else dares to say, the necessary things about navigating the places that weren't built for you and holding firm to your principles. Because, if you do that, you will help build a world where inclusion is real and racism a thing of the past. Just as Celina is now trying to do, in all her brilliance and boldness."-- Provided by publisher. |
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