Conversations with Leaders, Champions, and Luminaries; Canada 150 Women, Pauline Cameron
No matter what, when you curate a book of some kind of list, you will inevitably disappoint someone, and in this respect, this particular list book does not … er … disappoint. It seems, from the cover, that it’ll be a sure winner; a book of 150 prominent Canadian women, to remind or enlighten us that there are successful and engaging women across Canada that we can all celebrate and that young women can look up to a guides and mentors. And the team of curators do a decent job of trying to achieve diversity (although my very rough count still lands somewhere in the neighbourhood of 110-120 white women).
What’s lacking, however, is diversity in their definition of success. A great deal of the women in the book seem to have been chosen because they have achieved business success of some kind. There are LOTS of CEOs, business founders and motivational speakers. The few athletes (such as Silken Lauman and Hayley Wickenheiser) are self-employed life coaches or CEOs of their own business and seem to have been chosen for this reason rather than their (rather amazing) athletic achievements. What stands out is who’s missing. For example, Clara Hughes is notable for her absence from the book, despite being the only athlete to ever win multiple medals in both the winter and summer Olympics, and an activist for mental health awareness.
Even more surprising is the lack of artists. Oh, there are a couple of authors and at least one dancer, but again it’s their business acumen that seem to have won them a place in the 150 list. Missing are potential role models such as Eden Robinson (award-winning First Nations author), Margaret Atwood (kind of a very famous author!), and Anita Sarkeesian (feminist activist, media critic and target of Gamergate misogynists, who probably has a thing or two to say about courage and fortitude). And there are zero(!) actors, singers or musicians. I think if someone is trying to curate a book to identify successful Canadian women who could potential inspire young women to aspire to greatness, they could try a little harder to broaden their reach.
Random last thought. A weirdly large number of the women in the book listed their favourite drink as “water”. Call me judge-y but I find that answer uber-boring, although it may just be a reflection of my alcohol addiction hahaha.
Rating: I don’t want to dismiss the very legitimate achievements of the women included in the 150, so I have to rate this a buy. But there’s an opportunity here to do a better job, and the book club members are seriously considering taking it on.