MOTHER TONGUE
Dramaturg’s Note
Without the informal labor of this fleet of green-collar workers, millions of tons of recyclable materials would end up in landfills. Though not formally employed by Brazilian public institutions like municipal governments, pickers perform an essential public service. Some estimates hold that pickers contribute to the processing of 90% of Brazil’s recycled materials. Other countries throughout the world, especially those in the Global South, similarly depend on pickers for recycling streams and waste management. Even New York City has its own cadre of between 8,000-10,000 pickers, known locally as canners, who scour city streets for reusable material.
While pickers perform essential labor worldwide, their work has long been unrecognized by government officials and stigmatized by society at large. This dynamic has begun to shift in recent years, however. Over the last three decades, coalitions of pickers in countries like Brazil and Colombia have led effective movements for greater rights and recognition. Brazilian federal law now grants pickers some protections and benefits as laborers, and Brazilian cities are now officially incentivized to coordinate with pickers in their waste management programs. The inclusion of pickers in state-coordinated recycling streams in Brazil has influenced public policy in other countries. The grassroots movement that brought about these changes has deep roots in the city of São Paulo at a local picker-led recycling cooperative where materials are sorted and sold. Some of the stories in "Mother Tongue" were inspired by the workers at this cooperative.
Even as the labor of pickers has become more recognized, the lives of pickers themselves remains shrouded in stigma and prejudice. With "Mother Tongue," we invite audiences to cross these barriers of misunderstanding and connect with the inner and outer lives of these essential workers.
- Andrew G. Britt
Director’s Note
“Mother Tongue” is a work in progress based on Brecht’s “Mother Courage
and Her Children” and 35 interviews with Brazilian waste pickers, commonly
understood in the U.S. as informal garbage collectors who pick, sort and sell
recyclable materials as a way of living. The making of this piece has been a
collaborative endeavor amongst many, and now, after 10 weeks of an intense
rehearsal process, we are glad to open the doors of our process to the
UNCSA community.My journey with this piece started two years ago during my time at Studio For Creative Practice, UNCSA’s first interdisciplinary course. Since then, this piece has developed into research around questions of motherhood, accumulation of waste and our relationship to the unwitnessed lives of the people who collect our trash. Since the mid-20th century, the discard of our non-degradable waste has involved great travels through space and time, reaching our oceans, foreign countries and future underlands. Nowadays, according to The Guardian, 70% of plastic waste consumed in America ends up in foreign countries, and every year several U.S. waste containers are sent illegally to the shores of Latin American countries such as Brazil. Our waste has become a part of stories ingrained in distances and “Mother Tongue” proposes that, in times when our own ways of living threaten the well being of our planet, we shift our focus to the unwitnessed voices of waste pickers- powerful voices- capable of extending our compassion across the distances between our trash cans and foreign hands; between pain and memory; and between us and people we won’t live to see.
- Marina Zurita