Producer Talia Molé joins Shanna for an interview about her student debt experience and how her Ph.D. studies on matriarchies helped her envision a society where education prepares us to be thoughtful community members rather than future workers, among other imaginings.

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Transcript:

[00:00:05] Shanna Bennett: Hi, I’m Shanna Bennett. And I’m here with Talia Molé. You know Talia. She’s one of our wonderful producers on the podcast and an editor and has hosted an episode. We actually met Talia through some work we did with the Debt Collective, Talia is a debt striker. But more importantly, she is a Ph.D in some of the things that we need to discuss in this episode.

[00:00:36] So, if you were listening to the previous episode with River Butcher, towards the end there, River mentioned some really big words that had matriarchy and matriarchal in them, and we were not familiar. They sounded very sexy. We were intrigued. And then we realized that in our back pocket, our very own Talia Molé, knows all about this. So we’re gonna chat with her about what this means and how this could impact and affect student debt.

[00:01:11] And you’re listening to Matter of Life and Debt.

[00:01:14] Welcome to the podcast.

[00:01:16] So let’s dive right? I’m gonna mispronounce this. I’m gonna butcher it. But one of the terms was something like, matriarchal? And he was referencing another way of living, another way of structuring society. So let’s dive right in. Because we have so many questions.

[00:01:31] Talia Molé: Thanks, Shanna. And it’s nice to be here also as a guest. And not just behind the scenes. So you all mentioned matriarchy and I remember hearing the word matriarchal and basically I think one of the most important things to set out is that matriarchy is not the opposite of patriarchy.

[00:01:58] Patriarchy is a specific paradigm where the structure is hierarchical. There’s a position of power, the person or the entity on top dominates those in the bottom. It is characterized by a lot of violence. Extractivism if you will and what we’re living right now, I don’t need to go on.

[00:02:23] Matriarch is another paradigm in that it has a structure, which is very different. As far as the social level, it is horizontal, right? So there is this idea that there’s no hierarchy in that sense. Right? So there’s no woman on top, right. So matriarchies are matrilineal. Meaning that the ancestry is traced through the mother vein. They are also matrifocal or matrilocal, meaning that the members of the clan stay wherever the mother is. It has its own economy. So you’re gonna have economies where you have reciprocity, gift economy, mutual aid. As far as the structure, again, like I mentioned, it has a social structure where things are horizontal. You have a political structure as well, where things are, it’s an egalitarian consensus. That’s how you arrive at governance and at a cultural level, you’re going to have beliefs like religious beliefs that are centered around goddesses and the earth and whatnot.

[00:03:42] So it’s a very complex structure. It’s not, I would say it’s very unfair to say that matriarchy is the opposite of patriarchy because it simply isn’t, but that has also been by design. That fallacy, before anthropologists, for those that don’t know about me, I have a PhD in anthropology and social change, and I did my work around motherhood, queering motherhood specifically.

[00:04:12] In my literature review and just my studies on different forms of being mother, motherhood, and mothering historically. I saw and read that early anthropologist, which of course were males and white did this work in that they presented matriarch as the opposite of patriarchy, where woman is on top, the almost erasure of it as something that was either long ago or mythical, like it never existed.

[00:04:44] And if you think about it, if you’re going to oppress a culture and you’re going to oppress a society, especially during colonization where a lot of the nations that were thriving encountered the settlers. Those were matriarchal societies. And they saw these egalitarian practices.

[00:05:09] They saw specifically where the woman, or the role of women, was equal. They saw the, not necessarily monogamous way of relating. So for the settlers, that was really important to eradicate. And this is why you have the ideals of the pious woman, right over the, for lack of a better word, the who, which a lot of people of color are termed like that because we didn’t necessarily have practices of monogamy, which come from a Judeo-Christian background, that the settlers brought all over the world, not just here.

[00:05:56] But anyway, I mean, that’s just to start because, you know, I mean it’s seven years plus of work.

[00:06:02] Talia Molé: I think, you know what I guess to just, put a pause on that. I do wanna say that you and I were talking before and also with Nikki, and this is all to share that we want to highlight possibilities that are not in some distant past, they’re not mythical, but that we can find them here.

[00:06:25] We can find a lot of these practices in the here and now, and that maybe if we paid attention to them, we can be inspired to not only believe that a different and better world is possible, but that we are in the process of enacting it. We are in the process of making it. And I think it’s very important to highlight it as not just a possibility, but as a reality, because that’s another thing that capitalism, patriarchal capitalism, needs for you to believe. That this shit is the only way it’s been. It is the only way that it can be.

[00:07:07] And so we need to dispel that.

[00:07:09] Shanna Bennett: And I think, going back to the conversation we had before, it is so important to kind of be able to draw our attention, just reiterating what you’ve said to something different, to a different way of existing. Especially as it pertains to education, especially as it pertains to student debt.

[00:07:27] Because I think actually how it came up, in our conversation with River was I think we were looking at the system as it is. And how there is this extraction process happening. It’s you going to higher education for the sole purpose of getting a job versus actually the enjoyment of learning of, of having access to higher level thinking. And I think it was Emma that said it on the last episode, you know, how nice it would be to be able to have access to that. I think we’re presented with this concept of higher ed now being so much of a business, that a lot of that is lost. So it’s really important to be able to look at a different way we could structure our lives and also how we approach education.

[00:08:14] Talia Molé: Yeah, I mean education under this system, right? If we have to analyze it through a patriarchal paradigm and education here really is, it’s conceived to indoctrinate and prepare the future worker. Our bodies, if we’re on the bottom part of the hierarchy, our bodies really are used to reproduce whether it’s the next labor, the next worker, or, reproduce a particular type of knowledge.

[00:08:44] We are extracted from, and I think that that’s very important to highlight that under this current patriarchal system, it’s very hard to imagine life because it’s so set on destruction that all you can envision is death. And at the center of matriarchal practices, as I’ve studied them and read about them and also just witnessed around me, there is this responsibility and honor in sustaining life.

[00:09:23] Talia Molé: You want to do things in a way that reproduces life, not just reproduces life, as in your birthing, no reproduces life. As in you want the earth to thrive. You want your ideas to thrive. You want your relationships to thrive. You want your communities to thrive, your families, your friends. There is this very important impulse.

[00:09:51] It’s the heartbeat, you know, to just want to sustain that.

[00:09:56] Shanna Bennett: That’s beautiful. I think, River referenced maybe it was child rearing being the center of a structure like this, or caring for children or children being the center.

[00:10:09] Talia Molé: Well, again, I think, you know, one thing too, when you think about matriarchal societies is that you don’t necessarily see a lot of the “I”, right? The individual is recognized, but everything you do, it’s the “I” that informs the “we”, you know, you walk in that way. It’s the ubuntu in Africa that I am because we are, the “yo en nosotros,” you know, from Latin America, to single out particular sort of categories, right? Within a matriarchal structure, I feel that it is a symptom of what patriarchy has taught us. To look at something and automatically begin to categorize it so you can divide it.

[00:11:02] This is why sometimes I also think that I see groups and not necessarily communities in patriarchy, because it’s just groups of individuals that look alike and might do certain things that are alike. But when you really look into it, they’re very, very different. But in a patriarchal paradigm, it’s just important to put people that might look alike, you know, into certain groups so that you can then put ’em against each other. This is why there’s so many divisions. I think that there’s a big division as far as different, minority groups are under patriarchy, because the truth is the minority group is the global majority.

[00:11:42] Shanna Bennett: Exactly.

[00:11:42] Talia Molé: If we came together, if we came together as a people, then we could eradicate whiteness. Right? Cause I wanna also be clear that what we’re living today, aside from it being this patriarchal system of destruction and violence, there is something very prominent there it’s this belief of whiteness and anybody can be an agent of that it’s not just you being white.

[00:12:18] Anybody can be an agent of whiteness. And I say that because for many of us, it’s shocking to see black and brown people voting for Trump, you know, against abortion, like against, even like super, super, super religious. I speak for myself and I’m probably gonna get backlash on this, but you know, there’s some people that I see that there’s no belief systems I’m like, okay, glad that you believe in that, but do you also know the historical component of that belief system that you’re adhering to and what it did to your ancestors?

[00:13:01] If you have processed that and you’ve unlearned it and learned new ways of relating and being to that system, then more power to you. And I respect that, but a lot of people also are just kind of like they just follow along. So anyway, I don’t know where I got onto that, but I’ll leave that there before it gets more controversial.

[00:13:23] Shanna Bennett: I mean, you make some good points because I think what you’re saying, I think is ultimately, if you are not aware of your history, then you’ll find yourself aligned with some things that don’t really speak to you and your culture and your people and where you’re coming from. And I think I’ve just this week alone, I’ve kind of come to a head with that.

[00:13:44] I don’t know if that’s the term, but you know, with the death of the queen, for example, you know, growing up for a couple years, living in Jamaica, being born in Jamaica, you know, I’ve always seen her on our money.

[00:13:57] Then I came to understand that this was a living woman somewhere that was on our money, that just didn’t live with us, which was wild.

[00:14:03] Didn’t look like us at all. So for as long as I’ve been living, she has always been the queen and has had a very interesting relationship with the history of Jamaica and her independence. And so watching my mother actually mourn her this week has been very interesting. Then as someone who is like a very big Netflix person, I watch The Crown, so I think I like had this intimate knowledge of her at this point and I can relate to her as a woman and watching, you know, this idea of her life displayed on Netflix. But outside of that and the Monarch again, what it stands for does not align with anything that I believe in. So watching my mother mourn her and trying to remind my mother of the sorted history there and watching her kind of rebuff that and say, it’s in the past. She lived a long time and she’s passed away and I’m like okay, that’s fine.

[00:15:04] But I think knowing the history and kind of sitting with that will inform sometimes how we relate to some of the present day things.

[00:15:13] Talia Molé: To that point I do want to respectfully say that some people that are agents of whiteness and these ideologies, are dealing with a trauma that’s hard to face. And sometimes trauma puts us in a place where it’s easier to just acquiesce than to face a very difficult and harsh reality of how we arrived in the world today.

[00:15:46] And I mean, I can tell you the literature review of my dissertation, which by the way, is how I arrived at the Debt Collective, because let me just plug this in. We are a podcast about debt. You know, I have $370,00 right now in debt and one of the strikers and all that good stuff. But doing the literature review for my dissertation was one of the most painful things I had to do because reading the history of the erasure that exists, not just among the people that make me as a Caribbean person, but just the nations upon nations that were eradicated the genocide, the eradication of belief systems that are just so, they were so, I don’t even know how to put it like motherly.

[00:16:43] I guess thinking about it, like putting myself in that literature review position, like it’s actually horrible.

[00:16:50] You know, there’s a book I think everybody should read. It’s called, The Introduction to Reproductive Justice by Loretta Ross and Ricky Solinger. That was a book that I’m telling you was, a bit of a religious book for me during my dissertation. It speaks historically of some truths that are just very, very, very hard to swallow. And you know, sometimes a lot of people don’t want to necessarily sit with that truth because it’ll make you so rageful.

[00:17:19] And in a world where we have enough rage, how do we sit with that rage? How do we move through that rage? And for some people, it might just be easier to acquiesce and to just go with the flow and not necessarily do much. And I respect that. I honestly respect that. It’s not easy to sit with that.

[00:17:42] Shanna Bennett: To comment, first of all, thank you so much for the work that you’re doing with the Debt Collective. And thank you for striking. Not everyone can strike, not everyone has the stomach for it. And I’m glad that there are people that are using that as a means of protest. And I think even you saying your student debt amount, your loan balance is so important because we are getting the gift now of your education. And I think it’s priceless. The fact that there’s a price tag on that. A six figure plus $300,000 price tag on that is ludicrous to me.

[00:18:19] Talia Molé: Yeah. To me too.

[00:18:21] Shanna Bennett: I can, I completely understand the sadness and the anger associated with kind of wading in the waters of all that material that I’m sure you were ingesting.
You know, I think it was earlier this week, it was reported that 22 GOP governors signed a letter to President Biden, basically demanding that he withdraw his plan for student debt. And, in that very short letter, they state for one that this plan is punishing, what is it? It’s essentially helping the wealthy and punishing. Something like that.

[00:19:02] Talia Molé: Yeah, it’s giving a break to the elite and punishing the taxpayers, you know? Because they have to pay for this. And again, misinformation.

[00:19:13] Shanna Bennett: Yeah, and then they cite that the loan borrowers that hold $50,000 or more in student debt tend to have graduate degrees and this and that. And you know, why help the lawyers and the doctors.

[00:19:27] But what really angered me there is that group, those people that have $50,000 or more are women, they’re black and brown women, and they tend to be black borrowers. These are folks that hold higher debt balances, women hold two-thirds of the overall federal student loan balance.

[00:19:47] So, you know, they’re saying it without saying it, you know what I mean? So if we really want to uphold women, if we wanna uphold these people that are really the core of our society, then we will help them. We’ll alleviate this burden. We’ll look at the lawyer and the doctor who have $300,000, $500,000 of debt.

[00:20:10] And we will remove it and erase it and allow them to have had access to that education without that barrier, because ultimately they’re supporting their families and they’re supporting their communities. And oftentimes they are coming from families where there weren’t that many resources available to help them get access to higher education.

[00:20:32] So the fact that these folks actually signed their government names to this document. I’m like why? And the governor of the state that I live in Ohio, Mike DeWine, we see you. We’re embarrassed. We see you. It’s just really unfortunate.

[00:20:50] Talia Molé: Yeah, I mean, this is why we have to, when we say abolish, we need to abolish this education system because it’s just not working. But there’s a deeper meaning to the word abolish. It’s bringing down patriarchal structures. You know, this form of education is very particular to the system and this system needs it.

[00:21:19] When we mention the word abolish, not only are we saying, we gotta bring down those walls, we’re also saying we’re prepared to show you that there’s another way.

[00:21:29] Shanna Bennett: Right.

[00:21:31] Talia Molé: And you know, I think you bring a good point. I think we need to come together in the idea that there are very few people saying that. There’s more of us than there are them and bringing together a community, not a group, but a community of people that have shared values, shared beliefs.

[00:21:57] A shared responsibility to uphold life and respect. You know, when we bring a community like that in many ways, like we are a community like the Debt Collective is a community, not just a union of debtors. We are strong. We are strong because we can show the vast possibilities that exist aside from what we’re living right now. And that is very dangerous to the system. That is very dangerous to patriarchy. The first thing patriarchy does, especially in times of war is divide and conquer,

[00:22:38] So you gotta bring ’em together, you gotta divide ’em and then, you know, normally when prisoners are put in cells, there’s a reason why they’re put in cells by themselves. They can’t continue having dialogue because it’s in the dialogue and in that questioning and in that connection that they become powerful.

[00:23:01] Shanna Bennett: I think to speak to the erasure that you’re referencing earlier-

[00:23:07] I think, you know, debt and modern-day debt, I think is just another avenue to achieve some of those.

[00:23:16] Talia Molé: The appraiser.

[00:23:17] Shanna Bennett: Yeah. Because even this year, for example, I saw my family more this year than in maybe the past 10 years or so since I moved away.

[00:23:30] And I’ve really been reflecting on that recently and how happy It’s made me.

[00:23:35] And I am shocked that I’ve gone 10 years without seeing them. And I started to kind of question why that has been, and I’m realizing it’s you know, mainly finances. It’s just, I did not have the resources to do it before.

[00:23:51] A lot of that is tied to my student debt. My student debt and money and financial insecurities, I think that’s really unfortunate. So, you were actually affecting, you know, family connectivity, and those relationships, and somewhere along the line, I think probably early this year, I decided, you know, I wanted to kind of shift the little extra monies that I’ve been able to have, you know, this year due to the pause.

[00:24:19] Due to getting a slight, you know, increase at work, I’ve been able to put more money aside for traveling, which then has incorporated my family. And I’m telling you, I have had the time of my life this year. And, I’m just saddened by the fact that, you know? It’s just, now that I’ve been able to hang out with these people that I love so much, but debt is so intrusive.

[00:24:41] Talia Molé: Yeah. I mean, I can use this to tie in what I said at the beginning. Before we were introduced it was debt as well that got me to return home if you will, with my mom and it was my studies, my matriarchal studies that helped me through that shock. Because at my age, I’m like, what am I doing back here? But I am so just burdened with debt that everything was restricted for me. And I had to unlearn what patriarchy inculcated in me to be and to do, and the things that I should be doing at this time. I had to unlearn that and in its place, I put these studies that for me, what they did was again, showed me a possibility.

[00:25:43] And as I began to enact a lot of these possibilities, I not only grew a stronger bond than ever before with my family, but I also felt richer. Although I don’t have any material wealth, I feel wealthy because I have built a community where I genuinely know that they will never let me reach rock bottom.

[00:26:18] And honestly, that is a treasure. When we think of all of the illnesses of this system, to understand that I live within a community. That respects and upholds life in such a way that they will never let me die.

[00:26:39] Shanna Bennett: Right.

[00:26:40] Talia Molé: That’s unbelievably mind-blowing,

[00:26:45] Unbelievably mind-blowing. And so what that also signals is I don’t need the system as much as it has told me, I need it.

[00:26:57] And you start to really distance yourself from patriarchy. That’s where you start to see another possibility. It’s like, oh, wait a minute. There is another way that I can do this. And I’m still, okay. My networks are still with me. You know, it takes work. I’m not saying this is easy. You know, this is not easy and it’s not for the faint of heart, but if you’re able to do it and to distance yourself, as much as you can from this hegemonic system that we’re under right now, you can begin to sketch out a horizon, a new world. It is possible. Then the other key is you gotta believe it.

[00:27:42] It’s not enough to just do it. You must begin to believe it. One thing that I like about matriarch, just like my studies on matriarchy or whatnot is the mimicry meaning that you try to look at systems in nature and you mimic that.

[00:28:03] Right. And one of the sayings that I love the most, it’s originally a Greek saying, I don’t remember the Greek poet, but activist groups all over the world use this saying, and, it translates to: they tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds. And I think that that vision of being a seed, you know, of having all of this power in us and doesn’t matter how much weight of disaster and just shit you can put on us.

[00:28:40] Well, shit to a certain degree is good, you know, as compost, but you know what I mean, no matter how much crap you put on top of us, we will grow into something powerful. We will grow into that oak tree. We will grow into that forest, you know, and I think that’s important too. I start thinking like that too, you know, how do other systems around us survive catastrophes?

[00:29:02] How do they come out of problems, conflicts, you know? And, nature has a lot to inform us to teach us.

[00:29:11] Shanna Bennett: Mm-hmm I completely agree. And I think in terms of us being buried, going back to that analogy, I think it’s so helpful to share and be in fellowship and communion with other people, specifically women too, that have high student debt balances. I think that’s one of the things that we’re able to get through the Debt Collective and even the Instagram personal finance community.

[00:29:38] There are so many women that are leading families and they’re responsible for the finances and they’re openly sharing, here’s our budget for the month. Here’s my plan. Here’s how I’m gonna navigate six months, for example. And it’s so beautiful. And I think too, looking back to even five years ago, people were not openly talking about their student debt this way.

[00:30:01] This is a brand new phenomenon. It’s beautiful. We’re able to share. Now we’re able to draw energy from each other, which, as we’ve been using with the Debt Collective to really protest and make our thoughts and our feelings known, and that has been so beautiful to be a part of, because you don’t feel so shameful anymore.

[00:30:21] You’re able to share and say, hey, yeah, the system is broken. Here’s my debt balance. Here’s your balance. What’s our plan, you know?

[00:30:28] Talia Molé: And I don’t even think, I don’t know if I should say it’s by design or how it is, but, how it comes about, but female-identifying folk really are at the center of a lot of revolutions around the world globally. You know, they really are. And maybe because they’re some of the most oppressed bodies in the world and therefore they come together to fight that and revolt against that. But also because female-identifying bodies have also been given this role of staying, whether it’s at home or in a certain locale to rear children and to do all that. And so they tend to be more in groups. They tend to have more conversations. They tend to know more about each other. And I think that that solidarity is very, very important. Especially when that solidarity, it’s so infectious and you see these groups doing their thing. This global majority is a global minority, right? And if I see these people all over the world doing these things, how can I not wanna do that in the very center that I’m in right now?

[00:31:50] You know? So I think, there’s something to say for these bodies being the ones that are causing delicious trouble.

[00:31:58] Shanna Bennett: Yes. Yes. I’m not fine either. As someone I think maybe I’m an extroverted introvert. But usually if I have to go out and hang out with someone or like you were saying before, trying to be more social. I find that when I’m hanging out with women specifically, I come back so energized, which is, it’s usually flip flopped.

[00:32:20] I’m usually not coming back energized after social interactions like that. But with women in particular, and if you touch on any kind of personal finance talk or state debt talk, we all get so energized. And I think Debt Collective recently had that black woman dream space that I was able to be a part of.

[00:32:40] And that was beautiful because we had again, another group of women talking about their experiences with debt. And yes it gets a little, you know, dreary and sad. But we’re able to very quickly pick each other up and make a plan and kind of get excited about the future, which is why this conversation is important too.

[00:33:01] Talia Molé: Yeah. Yeah. And I think any group that we come together in where there’s a horizontality that’s being respected and we’re coming together based on our similarities as poster differences, and we’re coming together based on wanting to answer a call to dismantle something that is really against life.

[00:33:21] Shanna Bennett: Yes.

[00:33:22] Talia Molé: It’s going to be regenerative.

[00:33:25] It really, really, really is, you know? And I think that’s the important thing about what possibilities we engage in. You know, we need to engage possibilities that are regenerative, especially now that we’re talking about, mitigating climate change and just our world in general, you know, what possibilities are we sitting with that, rework the topsoil, you know, rework the earth, you know, on, as a metaphor and literally, so that we can begin planting seeds that are going to bear fruit, nutritious fruit.

[00:34:00] I think it made headlines this week. I’m gonna get this wrong. We can look it up, but the owner or founder of Patagonia is giving away his company that’s worth, I think $3 billion. And he’s, he’s essentially using those funds to fight climate change is what he is doing. So his entire family is giving this to us.

[00:34:22] Talia Molé: That’s fantastic.

[00:34:24] Shanna Bennett: Yeah, it’s beautiful.

[00:34:26] Oh, Nikki’s saying $100 million per year. Is that what they’re bringing in? And I think it is valued at something. Yeah. It’s like a multibillion-dollar company. So that should be really interesting seeing how that influx of funds changes or assists the overall climate change fight. That’ll be really interesting. And, again, very anti-capitalist quote unquote, right from my naive understanding of it. It just seems like he’s going against the grain here and being like we don’t actually need all this. Let’s use it to do something else. There’s no need to hoard wealth in that way.

[00:35:05] Talia Molé: Well, I mean, I think a true anti-capitalist would dismantle the system, right?

[00:35:11] A true anti-capitalist would be like let me and my workers, let’s all be a co-op and,and even then we’re still moving within structures of capitalism, but I mean, that’s a good start. I don’t necessarily wanna say that wealthy people are evil.

[00:35:30] You have millionaires or billionaires for Bernie or something like that. The progressive people that are willing to change. They’re not necessarily hoarders of their money. They’re willing to move it into sectors that are in dire need right now.

[00:35:47] And collaborate on social structures that promote a better community and better living. We just need those people to be a little bit louder.

[00:36:04] Shanna Bennett: Yeah, Mackenzie Scott, Jeff Bezos’s ex-wife who is committed to giving away a lot of her wealth to causes that she cares about.

[00:36:12] Talia Molé: But remember that comes back to them.

[00:36:14] Shanna Bennett: Yeah.

[00:36:16] Talia Molé: You know what I mean? A philanthropist is just another tool within patriarchy. It comes back to them, they get major tax write-offs and that’s capitalism being nice.

[00:36:29] Shanna Bennett: Right, right, right.

[00:36:33] Talia Molé: Yeah.

[00:36:34] Also randomly while we’re talking about current events, I think it’s Princeton University and maybe last week announced and I hope I get this right, but I think incoming students, if their families make less than the $100,000 I believe it is, will be exempt from tuition. Which…

[00:36:54] Shanna Bennett: is great. And again, we’re seeing these little glimpses of these proof of concept moments where we’re saying, oh, so we can do that. So that is possible. So you actually can use your endowment to cover the tuition for folks to make higher ed low cost or no cost.

[00:37:18] Talia Molé: I went to school for free.

[00:37:20] Shanna Bennett: You did?

[00:37:20] Talia Molé: I did my undergraduate for free. I went to a public university and it was great.

[00:37:25] You know, that’s the reason why I chose a public university, cause I was like, oh, it’s free. And I get to study what I want. And you know, I did that. I had second thoughts about getting my master’s because I had to get a loan.

[00:37:40] But at that time I was like, oh, you know, why not? I’m gonna be able to get a great job and then pay it off. And then the recession happened in 2009 and I was in Florida and one of the first sectors to be cut off was the social sector. I have a master’s in counseling.

[00:38:01] Shanna Bennett: Wow.

[00:38:02] Talia Molé: So the only job I could really get was going back and doing social work and getting paid, you know, back then, I think it was like $7 an hour.

[00:38:13] And you have to do those jobs because you have to get another 2000 hours before you can sit for the state exam to become licensed to practice. So I was really locked in. I was locked in and I was like, I can’t afford this. I guess I can’t afford it. So getting my doctorate was the only way out of a big hole. A very, very big hole.

[00:38:37] So I was just like, well, I’m already a hundred thousand dollars in. And you’re just like, I’ve never heard of that. I don’t even know what that looks like.

[00:38:46] Shanna Bennett: Yes.

[00:38:47] Talia Molé: So what’s a little bit more meanwhile is that I’m providing culture. I’m adding to culture. I’m helping build culture and all the while, in this country, I’m being looked at as a cockroach.

[00:39:02] I think the highlight of getting a doctorate was being able to travel as an anthropologist. You get certain monies and I had to do research in certain places outside of this country, how revered you are as somebody that’s studying and somebody that gives to culture.

[00:39:23] And cares about the communal consciousness.

[00:39:32] When you come here, nobody cares. It doesn’t carry the same weight.

[00:39:38] I was at the symposium listening to a list of certain professions that were weighted as the good ones are the ones you make money.
And then the ones that are the cradle of society, if you will, like teachers, are looked at as shit, for lack of a better word. It’s really sad.

[00:40:02] Shanna Bennett: It is. I was listening to a podcast a couple of months ago now. And this individual who I think studied the tax code, he was saying that you can tell what a society prioritizes or values by looking at the tax code, and clearly, for us, it’s wealth and building wealth.

 

[00:40:26] Talia Molé: Of course. Accumulation of it.

[00:40:28] Shanna Bennett: Yeah. You know, not so much children or families. It’s there, but you know, not to the extent that I think it should be,

[00:40:37] Talia Molé: It’s part of a narrative. Yeah. There’s a lot of feminist conversations where the idea of the family is that it positions as these are the people that are going to expand upon a particular nation, historically, that’s what it is. You know, the nuclear family in this country was to help build a project racial racialization, and then obviously certain bodies are needed to continue reproduction so that we have workers.

[00:41:14] So, that’s one way to see capitalism, patriarchal capitalism. II can teach this.

[00:41:24] Shanna Bennett: I love it. I love it. So if we were to apply this kind of structure and this kind of thinking to higher ed, what would that look like? Would it just be free, open-access education for everyone?

[00:41:48] Talia Molé: Well, I think the first tenant that’s really important is to understand and begin to believe what I think is a truth that knowledge, the co-production and the acquiring of knowledge is a right to humans. You know, we should not be charged for that.

[00:42:10] And, when you begin with that premise, the rest falls into place. Take the money out and all of a sudden wisdom purveyors, if you will, which is one way to see teachers and professors will be able to teach what they want and what they can and share. Right? Because really the production of knowledge is coming together and it’s a two-way street. You know, again, you have to crumple the hierarchy within education, where also the professor is put as this kind of elite God that knows everything.

[00:42:50] No, they don’t, we’re human beings too. We’re constantly learning. And I understand that I’m also a student. I have things to share and I hope to teach and I am also open to learning. And so we don’t see that reciprocity that much in this education system. And there’s a reason for it, you know?

[00:43:10] And now that you just don’t have teachers being allowed to even teach what they want. I mean, we have a serious problem right now with teachers just walking out and for good reason. I feel that in this country, teachers are treated as high-end babysitters.

[00:43:32] Shanna Bennett: Yeah. Even in childcare and daycare, we don’t pay those folks enough. Either coming from a family of immigrants that were nannies and daycare providers. I mean, these folks were literally caring for your children. Literally the future of our society.

[00:43:55] What should be our most proudest and valued possession and they can barely make ends meet. They are teaching and guiding and raising these children. So I think it’s really unfortunate and yes, there are very severe and serious teacher shortages across the nation. For all the reasons that we discussed. And of course, people are also not feeling safe at work. And that’s also an issue. And so you know, that’s really unfortunate as well, but speaking to education, being a right and a human right. I think that’s beautiful. And I think if we can try to get back to that place with higher education and take the very capitalistic business first approach out of it, that’s definitely something I could visualize.

[00:44:47] Talia Molé: I’m glad you said the word “getting back to”, because I think the most important thing is to understand that it hasn’t always been like this. A lot of my research also has to do with pushing back on language. And if something doesn’t sit right with me, how can I re-author this to have it sit right with me?
[00:45:06] And we can push back on a lot of language that impedes the imagination. And yes, we look back to our ancestors and the knowledge that is passed on to us, and then we mold it to the future. We mold it with what we know. It’s not also about going back in time and staying there, right?

[00:45:33] It’s about what were, again, the possibilities that were regenerative back then that have allowed us to survive up to this point and how can we mold them to fit the current times and the dire situation that we’re in. And so yes, education wasn’t always like this. In other systems, as far as I’ve studied and seen, you can see that too.

[00:45:56] There’s a lot of autonomous education projects all over the world. I’ve been very fortunate to be a part of some incredible projects, via this group called ecoversities. And I’ve seen just incredible things of people taking education into their own communal hands and learning what matters.

A lot of learning and a lot of higher education might be learning again, your mother tongue, which was taken from you because of settlers, colonialism, going back to the land and how can we sustain our lives there. So yeah, we have to also think about what is higher education? What does it truly mean to a communal body?

[00:46:43] Shanna Bennett: I like that. I have a few people at work that are continuing their education. And I don’t know what university this is because I think a few people are going to the same university and they keep talking about these self-paced courses and it’s blowing my mind cause it’s completely self-paced.

[00:47:03] And I think you have some check-ins online maybe, and they’re able to accomplish certain courses or certain subject matter within sometimes a couple days or a couple weeks based on their speed of getting through the information. And it’s beautiful because people are like throwing back these classes and attaining these degrees again at their own pace.

[00:47:31] Talia Molé: And imagine how cool it is to take it at your own space in a community.

[00:47:36] Shanna Bennett: Can you imagine, can you imagine? Oh my gosh.

[00:47:40] Talia Molé: Actually I’ve done it. So it is amazing. You know, again, it goes back to getting a group of people that have come together for a specific possibility, which is regenerative. And we want to sit in curiosity, respectful curiosity, and explore that. And what is cultivated is quite unique.

[00:48:03] Shanna Bennett: Yes. It’s interesting. Cause it sounds like a book club to me, as someone who’s never really experienced that maybe the closest I’ve gotten to that is graduate school. And in certain kinds of more open freer courses where the dialogue and the exchange of ideas become more important than the actual paper and book.

[00:48:24] Talia Molé: Yeah, yeah, of course.

[00:48:28] Shanna Bennett: Anything to add Talia?

[00:48:29] Talia Molé: I am writing a book, stay tuned.

[00:48:32] Shanna Bennett: Oh my gosh.

[00:48:33] Talia Molé: I’m writing a book on my studies, but I I don’t have a name for it yet. It’s called Motherhood Phoenix, which is the name of my work, but I am yet to have a publication date. I am yet to have an editing date.

[00:48:53] Shanna Bennett: Awesome. And I was gonna say, in terms of the black woman dream space, I know that Dr. B and Chanel, who were the organizers from the Debt Collective that are in charge of that initiative. After having the last meeting and it going over so well. And it honestly being this regenerative experience for a lot of the women there, including me, I think we’re hoping to see that happen again, maybe monthly.

[00:49:19] So look out for that as well.

[00:49:22] Talia Molé: And their documentary, which is really great.

[00:49:24] Shanna Bennett: Yes. Which we’ll probably talk about in a future episode, but yes, it’s The Big Debt.
They have released a documentary about black women and their experience with student debt featuring Maddie Clifford. We’ve also had her on the podcast in the past. So check that out. And we’ll have a link on the website for the documentary so you can find it.

[00:49:47] Well, Talia, it has been such a pleasure. You know, when River was mentioning these other ways that society and life could be structured, our interest was peaked specifically in terms of how it relates to student debt, how it could affect our lives.

[00:50:05] So thank you so much for coming on as a guest, not just a producer or a host at this time. And elaborating. It was really great. And I learned a lot and I hope our listeners will learn a lot as well.

[00:50:19] Talia Molé: Yeah. Well, it’s my pleasure. And of course, whenever I hear the word matriarchy and all these big words that were being used in that last episode, I got really excited. It means that the work is being done one way or another, and people are getting to know more about these possibilities, whatever they might call ’em, you know?

[00:50:37] And, that’s very exciting. It’s that in itself is a beautiful horizon. To set not as a destination. I like to say, I believe in utopias. I really do, but not as a destination, more as a horizon, a north star that we can be inspired by, and we can create them. Don’t let anybody tell you that they’re not possible.

[00:50:56] Shanna Bennett: I completely agree. Thanks again.

[00:50:58] Talia Molé: Thank you.

[00:50:59] Shanna Bennett: If you liked this episode of Matter of Life and Debt, subscribe and share it with a friend. It really helps people discover us. Matter of Life and Debt is hosted by me, Shanna. It is produced by Shanna Bennett, Emma Klauber, and Nikki Nolan.

It is edited by Nikki Nolan and Talia Molé, and transcripts and writing is done by Emma Klauber. Efe Akerman created the theme music.

Visit our website www.matteroflifeanddebt.com, where you can listen to more episodes, access transcripts, and get additional context for the subjects you just heard about. Absolutely for free the website again, www.matteroflifeanddebt.com.

Thanks again for listening.

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