Cotton Before it Became the Fabric of Everyone's Lives
The oldest strains of cotton tell a story of the people who cultivated it. Weaving Voices is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Learn more about Weaving Voices here. Find show notes here.And transcript here.
--------
39:23
Kantamanto Market-- life and livelihood in the throws of fast fashion's waste streams.
Sammy Oteng is a Kantamanto Market organizer in Accra Ghana. The market is a 28 acre site, historically created by the people of Ghana to repurpose and reuse materials. Since the onset of fast fashion, the marketplace has become a dumping ground for the waste of the Global North. In a country of 2 million, the marketplace is cycling orders of magnitude more individual garments than there are people. Beaches and open pits have become the homes for our overproduction.Weaving Voices is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Learn more about Weaving Voices here. Find show notes here.And transcript here.
--------
33:39
Labor's Lever & a Just Transition for Fast Fashion Workers
Ground building legislation was passed in 2021 to protect the California garment worker community from the “piece rate”, otherwise known as life threatening wages. We’ll talk to the Executive Director of the Garment Worker Center, an organization that worked with the affected community to design and push the law into place.Weaving Voices is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Learn more about Weaving Voices here. Find show notes here.And transcript here.
--------
37:05
Shedding Plastic, Our Modern Wardrobes Impact on Oceans & Soils
Plastic textiles are flowing and shedding into our soils, oceans and bodies. The reality of 60 percent of our clothing being plastic is that the lint that our textiles produce ends up where we least want it to be— and that includes our biosphere, oceans and soils. We're permeating our ecosystems with a material that microbes can't eat. Dr. Timnit Kefela researched the fate our plastic microfibers during her PhD candidacy at UC Santa Barbara's Bren School. She is very focused on the transfer of these materials into terrestrial ecosystems, noting that where the fibers end up is an environmental justice issue that needs to be addressed.Weaving Voices is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Learn more about Weaving Voices here. Find show notes here.And transcript here.
--------
38:00
Thread's of Life; A Visual Map of Indonesian Island Communities
For thousands of years to the present, the Indonesian archipelago textile communities have been producing intricately complex textiles— woven with yarns dyed in morinda root, indigo and hundreds of other dye plant recipes. In this interview with William Ingram, co-founder of Threads of Life, we discuss the plants, processes and non-material dimensions that guide the creation of millenia-old textile recipes.Weaving Voices is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Learn more about Weaving Voices here. Find show notes here.And transcript here.
Weaving Voices is a Whetstone Radio Collective podcast that stitches textile systems and traditions, economic philosophy, and climate science into a quilt of understanding. Designed to transform our thinking and actions both as citizens and material culture makers and users.
You can learn more about this podcast at WhetstoneRadio.com, on Twitter @whetstoneradio, on Tiktok and Instagram @whetstonemedia and subscribe to our Spotify and Youtube channel, Whetstone Media, for more podcast content. You learn more about all things happening at Whetstone at WhetstoneMedia.com.
Italia