Celeste Headlee

CTL-E-6187 · Person · journalist · contemporary

VERIFIED evidence grade — build store (JSON graph)

Combined Graph record U-07385 · provenance: build store (JSON graph), record CTL-E-6187.

Celeste Headlee is an American journalist, public-radio host, speaker, and author whose career has centered on the craft of conversation. Her official biography records a long public-radio career in which she served as executive producer of On Second Thought at Georgia Public Broadcasting and anchored or hosted programs including Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, Here and Now, All Things Considered, 1A, and Weekend Edition. She co-hosted the national morning program The Takeaway, from PRI and WNYC, anchored presidential coverage in 2012 for PBS World Channel, and continues as a regular guest host on NPR and American Public Media. Her TEDx talk on having better conversations is counted among the most-watched talks on TED's homepage, though the opened sources give different view totals, shown in this record's statistics rather than blended. She is the author of bestselling books including We Need to Talk, Do Nothing, and Speaking of Race, is president and CEO of the nonprofit Headway DEI, and is the granddaughter of composer William Grant Still. A 2026 publisher biography adds that she teaches journalism at Morgan State University and that a new book, Freedom's Daughters, was scheduled for release in October 2026.

Notes

Staged 2026-10-16 under CTL-GOV-006 (Scan Tail Wave 5 — 747 Program, Wave 12; fifth Scan Tail packet at the founder's 40-record size). Gate A (2026-10-16): Gate A: hand-checked entities.json (3,843 entities) — no Celeste Headlee record exists; CLEAR. William Grant Still has no entity in the graph under that name, and no NPR, WNYC, Georgia Public Broadcasting, or Morgan State University endpoint was found for relationship use. Supply: Supply: 747 Supply Ledger Tier 4 scan-tail reserve (Scan Tail Wave 4 banked), scan #2194. SCOPE GATE: 747 Supply Ledger Tier 4 scan-tail reserve banked by Scan Tail Wave 4; corpus-gap-candidates rank #2194; Scan Tail Wave 5 Batch C assignment. Vital status: Living — confirmed active in dated 2026 material: the Audible author page (accessed 2026-10-16) announces her book Freedom's Daughters for October 2026 and a current Morgan State University teaching post; her official site presents current speaking and hosting work. STATISTICS — CONFLICTS SHOWN, NOT BLENDED. Career length: her official site says a 20-year career in public radio; the Audible author page says a 25-year career — both recorded as published, not reconciled. TEDx talk views: official site says over 34 million; Audible says more than 40 million — both are publisher/official claims as of access on 2026-10-16, and neither was independently counted by CTL. Points of agreement between the two opened sources: the anchored-program list (Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, Here and Now, All Things Considered, Weekend Edition), The Takeaway co-hosting, the 2019 Media Changemaker Award (also on the official site), and the Headway DEI presidency. New-book date (Freedom's Daughters, October 2026) and the Morgan State University teaching post appear only on the Audible page and are attributed to it alone in the description. MEDIA: photo HELD (HELD — candidate: the portrait photograph used on Celeste Headlee's official About page (celesteheadlee.com). No license is claimed or verified; status HELD under CTL-PHOTO-001. — named candidate only; file-level rights verification per CTL-PHOTO-001 still required; no license claimed); chart FILLED (charts/chart-ctl-e-6187-celeste-headlee.svg); video HELD (no matching-entity CTL Short or verified-rights archival video staged); audio HELD (no rights-cleared matching-entity audio staged); map N/A (person record). MEDIA LAYER (staged 2026-10-16; full per-asset PHOTO-001 records + embed specs in the packet's staged JSON, Drive packet folder): map = N/A (Person record; map specification applies to place records only, per brief (Persons N/A).) | visual_assets = HELD: | chart = FILLED (CTL-created chart (black / deep red / gold) built only from this record's sourced statistics and timeline fact) | video = HELD (Checked against the CTL Shorts Link Map (shorts-link-map-2026-10-15.json, 233 entries) by entity name and titl) | audio = HELD (No CTL audio asset staged. Headlee's public-radio hosting (including The Takeaway and NPR guest hosting) is do)

Sources

• Celeste Headlee official site, About Celeste Headlee (celesteheadlee.com) (accessed 2026-10-16) — Journalist and radio host; author of We Need to Talk, Do Nothing, Speaking of Race, and You're Cute When You're Mad; TEDx talk viewed over 34 million times per this source and among TED's 10 most-watched; 20-year public-radio career per this source; executive producer of On Second Thought at Georgia Public Broadcasting; anchored Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, Here and Now, All Things Considered, 1A, Weekend Edition; co-host of The Takeaway (PRI/WNYC); 2012 presidential coverage for PBS World Channel; regular NPR/APM guest host; 2019 Media Changemaker Award; president and CEO of Headway DEI; granddaughter of William Grant Still — https://celesteheadlee.com/about-celeste-headlee/ (primary source · build store)
• Audible author page, Celeste Headlee (audible.com) (accessed 2026-10-16) — Author list adds It Starts with Self-Compassion; newest book Freedom's Daughters to be released October 2026; teaches journalism at Morgan State University; TEDx talk viewed more than 40 million times per this source; 25-year public-radio career per this source; anchored Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, Here and Now, All Things Considered, Weekend Edition; co-host of The Takeaway; president and CEO of Headway DEI; granddaughter of William Grant Still — https://www.audible.com/author/Celeste-Headlee/B01CBR79D0 (build store)

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Record CTL-E-6187 · Combined Graph record U-07385 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · 2 sources.
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Researched and maintained by the CultureTechLens research program · CultureTechLens Combined Graph, Release 2026-11-04. Corrections are public: the corrections log.

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