November 30, 2025 • 28 mins
This episode originally aired November 21, 2019
With Thanksgiving right around the corner, Titi and Zakiya discuss the huge impact of European colonialism in North America, not only from the severe depopulation of Indigenous peoples, but also the relationships they cultivated with the plants, animals, and the environment around them. Guest: Dr. Nicholas Reo.
Dope Labs is where science meets pop culture. Because science is in everything and it’s for everybody.
Stay up to date with Dope Labs, Titi, and Zakiya on Instagram and at DopeLabsPodcast.com
Joining Lemonada Premium is a great way to support our show. Subscribe today at bit.ly/lemonadapremium.
Click this link for a list of current sponsors and discount codes for this show and all Lemonada shows: lemonadamedia.com/sponsors
To follow along with a transcript, go to lemonadamedia.com/show/ shortly after the air.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
So Thanksgiving is next week. Oh boy, are you cooking? No?
Speaker 2 (00:04):
I'm not.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
What a time I was about to say, what was
the last time you didn't cook for Thanksgiving? That's that's wild.
No turkey for me, No turkey in my house, period,
because none of us like it. Like we used to
get turkey every year and now we're just like, no,
we don't like turkey. Let's just say that that's not
a part of what we eat. I eat thea kias turkey,
to be clear, because she she does something different. It
(00:26):
tastes very good. The kiss turkey tastes like ham, and
so I will eat that bird.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I know this is like the first Thanksgiving in forever
that I'm not cooking, but I'm happy to say I
will not be rattling pots and pans.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
I never cook for Thanksgiving. If somebody asks me to
make something, I usually just do like mac and cheese,
and that's it.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I remember that boomerang from when you made that mac
and cheese. Oh man, it looks so good.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
People like it. I don't really eat mac and cheese
like that.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
I know this goes against everything that we know. Everybody
that's listening, you know you're not supposed to eat the
mac and cheese. If somebody says I don't eat mac
and cheese like that and they made it.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
It's actually very good. Yes, because I have everybody taste
tests and I'm like, be honest, and it's my sister,
so they're always going to be honest. So I'm t
T and I'm Zakiah and from Spotify Studios. This is
Dope Labs.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Everybody knows we love food. It's no secret We've talked
about it so much. But I think there's always so
many of these complicated relationships with food. Some of them
are around culture, some of them are around like sourcing
of food, and Thanksgiving is just one of those food
based holidays. And I'm like, I don't know about this.
I know probably since maybe the fourth grade, I've been
(01:54):
standing up and talking about the Pilgrims wiping out the
Native Americans every year.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Yes, so Thanksgiving has a sordid past and people becoming
less enchanted with the idea of Thanksgiving because of what
it's rooted in and what it's based on in its history.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yes, it's not like that Peanuts cartoon that they show.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
No, and it ain't construction paper feathers and no turkey sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Draw your hand and.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Turn it into a turkey. It ain't none of that.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
It's none of that. Gather around the corner coopia.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
No, it ain't no cornucopia. Okay, everybody's just starting to
feel like, no, I'm not with it. Like the only
Christopher we acknowledge is Wallace.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
So in this episode, we're basically rolling these all of
these kind of feelings mm hmm and truths, yes, into
one big ball of dough. That's how you can kind
of put it.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
What you make with that dope pie truth pie pie.
I hope it'sleep.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
We are talking about colonialism specifically, we're looking at colonialism
through the lens of ecology. So if you don't know
what those words mean, hang tight. We're moving straight to
the recitation. So we say we're talking about colonialism through
the lens of ecology.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Colonialism is a human process that has to do with
unequal power structures one society interfering with another society's ability
to thrive. There are a bunch of different types of colonialism,
but what we're going to focus on in this episode
is called Setler colonialism. Sellar colonialism implies a group of
people moving into another group of people's territory and claiming
(03:39):
it as their own, and in order to do that,
they are willing to eliminate that other group of people physically, culturally,
and everything else.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And the lens through which we're going to explore colonialism
is ecology. If you remember from our Cuffing season episode,
Ecology is a branch of biology that deals with the
relationship of one organism to another, and those organisms to
their physical surroundings.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
I think it's important for us to kind of unpack
some of this stuff and talk about some of the
broader ramifications of colonialism. Like we're becoming more and more
aware of the effects that it had on the Native
American population, But there are other things that were affected too.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Right. We know there are lots of plants and animals
that are extinct that exist no more.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Right there are fruits and veggies that are not indigenous
to North America that are here, that are here that
we eat daily, that are in our supermarkets, that are
now grown in the United States. But I have a
lot of questions about all of this because I feel
like I only like see like a little little corner
of it. It's like, not even like the tip of
(04:50):
the iceberg. I don't even feel like I see the
full tip of the iceberg. I feel like I can
only see like a snowflake. And so I really just
want an avalanche of information about all of this, the
effects on flora and fauna, the effects on the indigenous
people of North America, the effects on animals and everything.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
That's an ambitious I know it's good, right because I
think what it says is that you understand that there
are effects, right. There are often people think like, oh,
it's just you know these groups and then you know,
my cousin is part Cherokee, and it's like, no, no, no,
you don't understand all of these groups that were basically eradicated.
You know. So we've got these big questions, but what
(05:35):
do we really want to get to the bottom of?
What are we pressing out here?
Speaker 1 (05:38):
One of the things is what was the ecology of
North America before European colonialism? Yeah, and how did the
indigenous communities interact with their environment before then?
Speaker 2 (05:50):
Yeah, there's probably a lot we can learn. And then
I guess the next question that follows that is how
was ecology affected after colonialism started? So now these people
are here. Is it a rapid decline? Is it gradual?
Like what's happening?
Speaker 1 (06:06):
And I think the last question that I have is
what do we do going forward with all the information
that we're about to get. What are the steps that
we can take as citizens of America, citizens of this world,
citizen scientists, as global citizens, as I like to say,
to make things better and to improve the environment.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Yeah, because I think we're definitely at a point now
where we're back in the stage of conservation, trying to
undo all of this stuff that's been done in the
past couple hundred years.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
And you can't know where you're going unless you know
where you came from. A so let's get into the
dissection and to help us out, we called on doctor
Nicholas Rio.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
I'm a citizen of the sus Saint Mary tribe of
Chipwall Indians, which is a tribal nation located in Northern
Michigan what's now known as Northern Michigan. And I'm an
associate professor of Native American Studies and Environmental Studies at
Dartmouth College.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Doctor Rial Studies Indigenous Knowledge and Ecological Stewardship on Indigenous lands.
Another area of his focused is broadening discussions on climate
change and invasive species by including indigenous lives and indigenous perspectives.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
What is invasive species.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Invasive species are organisms that are non native to an area,
and so often because they're not native, they're able to
take over an area and eliminate other native plants. Or
if a native plant is wiped out and an invasive species,
a non native plant is brought in, then they kind
of like claim that area.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Settlar colonialism on a plant scale and animal scale.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Doctor Rio is the perfect guest for this episode because
when we talk about European colonialism, it's always through the
lens of the Europeans, yep, Like they were these great
people that they were going out and building these ships
and sailing across all the seven seas and doing this
really great work. But there were other people on these
(08:03):
lands that were already there, living and thriving before they
got there.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
And in this episode, we really want to talk about
the land in the context of the indigenous experience, knowledge,
and rich history.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
So let's start by talking about the northeast region of
what is now known as the United States way before
European colonialism.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So the Northeast is a huge region. Prior to European contact,
you had a lot of people. It was, first of all,
very much a peopled landscape. We tend to underestimate not
only the presence of indigenous people, but the influence of
indigenous people on the landscape.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So not only was the land highly populated by diverse
indigenous communities, it was also very developed, but not in
a way that was familiar to Europeans.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
When Europeans first laid eyes on, you know, the various
parts of the Northeast, they misinterpreted those spaces as being
you know, natural quote unquote, as being wilderness and defining
that as a place that is sort of, you know,
kind of it's got the natural ecology going on and
that doesn't involve human interference or inputs.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Just because they didn't recognize a neat, little English garden
didn't mean that the land hadn't been cultivated for a
long period of time. Indigenous tribes in the Northeast were
producing food and medicine within the landscape through really dynamic,
committed relationships with different plants, animals, and ecosystems.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
I feel like there's a lot we can learn from
what the relationship is between self and environment right from
some of these indigenous groups, because you have to think
if they were making medicine and doing all this stuff,
but when you show up with your European eyes, you
felt like the land was uninhabited.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
Right.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
That speaks volumes in my mind right about not disturbing nature,
and there have to be some clues learn they're about
conservation and to help us understand this relationship, Doctor Rio
told us about the important connection between a Nishionabe people,
one of the indigenous groups in the Great Lakes region
of North America, and their important relationship to wild rice
(10:14):
or what is called in the national language mynomen.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
It's a very culturally significant plant and being to Annihanabe people.
It's really a core part of our cultural identity. It's
a core part of how we understand where we fit
in the world. And it has an incredible nutritional value too,
and so it's an important part of our food ways.
We don't just treat it like it we're a relative.
It's like literally a part of our ken.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
It's just like the respect that you have for your
friends or your family, Like respecting them doesn't mean, you know,
not checking in on them, not giving them the resources
they need to survive, not talking to them and making
sure that they're okay, Like they approach it the exact
same way, like it's their family, and the Innitianabe approach
(10:58):
to the care and harvesting of this world rice is
with the same kind of respect.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
The specific ways that we knock rice into our boats.
It allows for the plants to produce more seed and
for a lot more of that seed to actually germinate
at the bottom of the lake bed than if you
were to not touch it at all.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
I mean, I think that's really interesting because when we
think about respect, sometimes you think that means like leave
it alone, don't touch it. But in this case, they're saying,
we are doing specific actions to stimulate growth, right, to
encourage seeds to drop down into this fertile soil and
to grow more plants.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
I think that there's a lot of examples like that
where it's definitely a sort of an indigenous perspective about
reciprocal relationships between humans and plants and humans and animals.
Indigenous perspectives more often hold that our dynamic engagement with
those plants and animals helps them to thrive in various ways.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
So that's a great point. What about the animals? For
the Initionabe, there is also great importance on interaction between
humans and animals. There's a relationship there that requires attension
and care. Doctor Rio gave us a great example.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
So for Nishinabe folks, some of our oldest teachings about
our connections to other beings on this planet tell us
that we are on a parallel path with wolves, who
we refer to as Mayingen, and that whatever happens to Mayingen,
what happened to the Nishanabk. Both Mayingen and a Nishanabek
(12:28):
rely heavily on wawashkashe or the deer as a really
important part of our food ways. If the deer population
is suffering, then we'll see Mayingen and a Nishnabek both
populations suffering. And so we're integrally tied together and our
fates are interwoven, and recognizing that connection makes a Nishanabic
(12:49):
folks very committed to the well being of both wolves
and deer.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
I think that's a great illustration or example of like
how we're all tied together. People say it, but like
this is that in practice.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
Absolutely, Like there's no distinction between us and the trees
and the leaves and the grass and the seeds. We're
all a part of this world ecosystem.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, so we've learned that for centuries before European colonialism started,
North America was a densely populated and diverse region where
indigenous peoples thrived by cultivating sophisticated intimate relationships with plants, animals,
and the rest of the ecosystem around them. But what
happened when the Europeans got there? How are those balances affected.
We'll get into those questions right after the break.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
We're back. And as doctor Rio explained, before European colonialism,
indigenous communities in North America had for centuries been thriving
off the land through their highly evolved and complex cultural practices,
specifically their relationship with the environment around them.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
What we know is that these practices were severely disrupted
when the Europeans arrived. So basically, when Europeans arrived, they're like,
I don't recognize any of this. This needs to be tamed,
this needs to be put into, you know, my category
of gardening, or like, I don't.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Know these animals, where are the animals that we're used to.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
For them, everything was discovery that was waiting to be influenced.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
The major effect of European colonialism is the genocide of
indigenous people period. But there are other things that were
also affected that doctor Rio helped us dive into more.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
He told us about major changes in four main areas, diseases,
invasive species, deforestation, and global biotic exchange.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Some of the sort of categorical changes that we have
seen come from the introduct of diseases.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
My friend was not lying when she said the Pilgrims,
that's right.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Tuberculosis, smallpox, the flu. These were all brought from Europe
and contributed to the depopulation of North America.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
These diseases that were brought from Europe to North America,
they were very influential in the severe reduction in the
human population of the continent prior to the big waves
of colonization. You know, the changeover from primarily, you know,
from an indigenous human population to relatively short order a
predominantly euro American settler, euro Canadian settler population. You know,
(15:41):
a great deal that had to do with the introduction
of diseases.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
This is interesting, he said, You know, the severe reduction
of human population of the continent prior to the big
waves of colonization. So this is not just violence with
a sword, right, Like, this is biological warfare for real.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
The next area that was greatly affected was invasive species.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
The introduction of European agricultural systems came with a lot
of associated pest species. So Europeans brought some species on
purpose that had deletorious impacts on the North American landscape,
and then they brought in some as hitchhikers.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
And it's so interesting because you know, the question is
was it intentional? Was it unintentional? But we know, you
know the Spanish, right, they really pride themselves on being explorers.
And I think I was reading somewhere that the Spanish
crown used to require all of their exploratory ships right
to carry seas and plants and livestocks when they went
(16:38):
on expeditions. Right, this is so they could establish European
forms of agricultural production. Can you imagine, You're like, I'm
going somewhere, I don't know anything about it, but I'm
taking my cow, taking my pig, a couple of these seeds,
and it's like, you don't know what those effects are.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Right. It's just like if so we live on the
East Coast to move to Arizona, which is a lot
of desert and things like that, and we say, well,
I don't want to live in the desert. I want
to live and what I'm used to. I want to
have a lawn I want to have I don't want
to have you know, these types of trees. I don't
want palm trees. I want like a regular maple tree.
And we go there and we dig up the earth
(17:16):
and we put down soil that is that a maple
tree can live in, and we change the ecosystem around
us to fit what we want that is existing on
the East Coast, and that begins to buy default change
everything around it.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's like the Butterfly fect. Yeah you know that movie, Yes,
with Ashton Kutcher. Yes, it's like the Butterfly Fact, except
you don't get to go back and do it over exactly.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
And preserving these natural parts of different environments is super
important to the overall health of the ecosystem.
Speaker 3 (17:52):
And it's not only plants but also animals. And then
one of the more notable one is hogs. So bringing
in pigs and letting them sort of run free. They
naturalized and had major impacts on forests of New England
and other other regions.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
That's wild to me.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
There were no hogs here.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
That's the major industry in North Carolina.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
When we think about America and how Americans eat, pork
is a major part of that. And I've never considered
that they weren't indigenous to North America. But they've not
only contributed to our diet, they ate up a lot
of the forests.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, you know, I see this in the movies all
the time, and they say like how pigs and hogs
can totally like rip up roots and everything with their
snouts and clear whole fields of like trees and grasses
and native grasses. But also I see people use pigs.
They say they will eat anything, like they will eat humans.
They will eat Did you know that now, Yes?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
So that leads us into the next topic that was
really affected by colonialism, deforestation.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
So European settlers cut down forests in ways that had
never really been It's not that it's not that indigenous
peoples didn't cut trees, certainly they did, but the scale
of timber harvest is that a completely different level by
European settlers.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
One thing that the Europeans were doing was cutting down
a lot of trees, yes, in order to have like.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
Rolling hills like they had in Europe.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Exactly to more so mimic what they had in Europe,
and then also to like build stuff. And when they're
shipping things to other countries, they want to put it
into a box, and the cut down a tree to
build a box for that and things like that. But
another thing that came along with that is that they
also were bringing over trees, yes, that are native to Europe, right,
(19:43):
because they wanted to again mimic the European landscape. And
these trees when they would bring them over, they would
bring them over the whole tree and roots and everything everything.
And so when you're bringing the roots along, you have
to bring the dirt and soil that it was in. Yeah.
And when they did that unintentionally or intentionally, we're not
really sure, but they also brought over earthworms. The earthworm
(20:07):
is not something that is native to the United States,
and so they would come over with the tree, they
would plant it in the ground, and these earthworms they
spread like wildfire. We see earthworms from sea to shining sea, Okay,
like they are everywhere and what we don't know because
when we think about earthworms, we're like, oh, they're so
good for our ecosystem and things like that. But earthworms
(20:29):
also have contributed a lot to deforestation. I'm looking at
this picture from a paper that somebody wrote that shows
two pictures, a picture of a forest with no earthworms, right,
and a forest that has earthworms, And there is a
clear difference. There's still trees. It looks like a forest
that we would walk through. It has trees, it has
(20:50):
little bushes, it has you know, logs and everything like that,
but the forest is impacted by earthworm. Conception of leaf
detritus leave to try is the kid. You can explain
it way better than me.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, it's just like falling leaf waste or debris. But
that also is like fertilizer, right. That is then those
nutrients from those deadlys are then reconsumed by that soil.
They add bat you fall from the tree cover down
to the ground, you provide nutrients for that soil.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
So the earthworms are eating all that stuff up, which
completely changes the look and feel of the forest.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
And the last of these categories is global biotic exchange.
So this is the movement of products, food, agricultural products
across the globe.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Basically, especially as we as we see the movement of
not just people but sort of products and goods. When
we see global trade pickup, and there's the movement of
products food, agricultural products, but also things that are made
of wood or that require the packaging of wood and
pallets and things like that. But just the movement of
(21:56):
goods across continents through shipping, sort of the globalization of
our economic system, then we see a huge increase in
biological introductions across continents, and that's a big impact.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
I think an important point to make is that all
of these categories that we're talking about do not exist
in isolation. When you affect one, you affect all of them.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Right, And that's what makes the impact so large. Right.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
So, even something like deforestation and disease. So let's say
that they bring over hogs that eat up all the
plants and the trees and everything like that. But there's
a specific plant that they used for medicine, and if
that plant is no longer there and this disease shows up,
that they would normally use a plant as this plant
as a treatment and the planet isn't there, then you
(22:41):
would have depopulation, yep.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And then what is the effect of the depopulation, right,
Because when we think about these intentional relationships with plants
and animals, if you're wiping out these indigenous communities, who
is the steward of this land now?
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Right? Who's cultivating and who's building? Those are relationships with plants, animals, trees,
and everything in between.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Yeah, we have to think about the impacts of genocide.
The depopulation of the Americas, the severe reduction of indigenous
populations had a huge impact on the things that we're
talking about and the context of you know, if what
we saw. You know, you asked, what would the northeast
have looked like prior to European contact? And I said, well,
(23:26):
a lot of what you saw had to do with
relationships between plants and animals and humans. When you take
a lot of the humans out of that picture, it
affects what's going on ecologically more broadly.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
The other really interesting thing is that this is not
just a historical issue, like this is something that persists.
It's still happening today in so many ways.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, on reservations where indigenous communities experience disproportionately high rates
of unemployment, health issues, and suicide.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
And so when we talk about when people, especially indigenous
studies scholars, talk about settler colonialism, we don't talk about
it as something that happened. We talk about something that's ongoing.
So as long as there's a settler presence, and as
long as Indigenous lives are being eliminated, as long as
Indigenous cultures are being ignored or eliminated, then settler colonialism
(24:18):
is ongoing. It's a set of structures and not a
moment in time.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
So, like you were saying, these things are persistent. It's
not something that's just in the past and we just
look back on it and say, oh man, that sucks.
We're still currently dealing with all of these things. So
my question is what can we do going forward to
make our environment better, not just for our plants and animals,
(24:47):
but for the indigenous population as a whole.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
I think we have to figure out ways to make
space for indigenous peoples. We need to be able to
make space physically. You know, people need physical space for
their for their political and cultural and economic endeavors. So
that has to do with returning land so we need
to make that kind of space. Make space politically so
that the places that indigenous peoples do have some control,
(25:12):
you know, reservations, other places, urban centers where indigenous peoples
are living and have some control, to create policy structures
that allow them to have self determination for their own futures,
to determine their own future paths, and to not interfere
with a lot of court rulings and policies that interfere
with their ways of interacting with the world. And to
make space ontologically to recognize the importance of indigenous ways
(25:36):
of understanding the world and ways of being in the world,
to make space for that in our education system and
the court of law and other places.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
As people who want to be aware of, you know,
all the ways that we are affecting our environment and
the ecology. I think this kind of just shine a
light in a very dark corner, Yes.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And I think there's a lot to be learned here,
right even in your outlook and approach. Sometimes these things
can feel so overwhelming and you feel like, oh, well,
there's nothing I can do. But I think even some awareness,
some space and just thinking about taking this interconnected approach
to everything that you do to conservation, to changes you
(26:33):
want to make right. It all matters.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Yeah, I mean, do a little bit of research on
where you're from, your town, your state, and find out
about the indigenous people of that area and take that
first initial step. And once you can find out what
they were doing and the way that the landscape looked,
then you can make deliberate efforts to improve our environment.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
There are a lot of organizations that are pushing back
to replanting some of our native seeds and plants, and
so there's a lot of opportunity you just have to
go looking for.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
What I think I might do is do some research
on the indigenous people of Maryland and my county, PG
County and find out the types of food that they
were eating and maybe try and make something with those ingredients.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
I hope they're still around for you to do it exactly.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
It might be tough, but I think it's worth it.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Yeah, I'm in. I'm in.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
That's it for Lab eighteen. Don't forget to check out
our website for a cheat sheet on today's episode. You
can find it and sign up for our newsletter at
Dope labspodcast dot com.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
Also, we love hearing from you what did you think
about today's lab? What are your ideas for future labs?
Give us a call. Our number is two zero two
five six seven seven zero two eight. You can also
find us on Twitter and Instagram at Dope Labs. Podcasts,
tt is on Twitter at dr Underscore t.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
SA, and you can find Zakiya at z Said So.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Follow us on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Special thanks to our guest doctor Nicholas Rio. You can
find out more about his work in our show notes.
Our producer is Jenny rattlet Mass of Wave Runner Studios.
Mixing and sound design by Hannis Brown and special thanks
to Tyler Adams.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
Original theme music is by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex sugi Ura,
with additional music by Elijah Alex Harvey.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Dope Labs is a production of Spotify Studios and Mega
Own Media Group, and it's executive produced by us T. T.
Shadia and Zakiah Wattley.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
Kats are not native to the United States.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Yes, the bird people have been really telling me a
lot about that, because they're saying that well, the bird
people I follow on Twitter. Shout out to the Autobon
Society
So Thanksgiving is next week. Oh boy, are you cooking? No?
Speaker 2 (00:04):
I'm not.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
What a time I was about to say, what was
the last time you didn't cook for Thanksgiving? That's that's wild.
No turkey for me, No turkey in my house, period,
because none of us like it. Like we used to
get turkey every year and now we're just like, no,
we don't like turkey. Let's just say that that's not
a part of what we eat. I eat thea kias turkey,
to be clear, because she she does something different. It
(00:26):
tastes very good. The kiss turkey tastes like ham, and
so I will eat that bird.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I know this is like the first Thanksgiving in forever
that I'm not cooking, but I'm happy to say I
will not be rattling pots and pans.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
I never cook for Thanksgiving. If somebody asks me to
make something, I usually just do like mac and cheese,
and that's it.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I remember that boomerang from when you made that mac
and cheese. Oh man, it looks so good.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
People like it. I don't really eat mac and cheese
like that.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
I know this goes against everything that we know. Everybody
that's listening, you know you're not supposed to eat the
mac and cheese. If somebody says I don't eat mac
and cheese like that and they made it.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
It's actually very good. Yes, because I have everybody taste
tests and I'm like, be honest, and it's my sister,
so they're always going to be honest. So I'm t
T and I'm Zakiah and from Spotify Studios. This is
Dope Labs.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Everybody knows we love food. It's no secret We've talked
about it so much. But I think there's always so
many of these complicated relationships with food. Some of them
are around culture, some of them are around like sourcing
of food, and Thanksgiving is just one of those food
based holidays. And I'm like, I don't know about this.
I know probably since maybe the fourth grade, I've been
(01:54):
standing up and talking about the Pilgrims wiping out the
Native Americans every year.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Yes, so Thanksgiving has a sordid past and people becoming
less enchanted with the idea of Thanksgiving because of what
it's rooted in and what it's based on in its history.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yes, it's not like that Peanuts cartoon that they show.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
No, and it ain't construction paper feathers and no turkey sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Draw your hand and.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Turn it into a turkey. It ain't none of that.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
It's none of that. Gather around the corner coopia.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
No, it ain't no cornucopia. Okay, everybody's just starting to
feel like, no, I'm not with it. Like the only
Christopher we acknowledge is Wallace.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
So in this episode, we're basically rolling these all of
these kind of feelings mm hmm and truths, yes, into
one big ball of dough. That's how you can kind
of put it.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
What you make with that dope pie truth pie pie.
I hope it'sleep.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
We are talking about colonialism specifically, we're looking at colonialism
through the lens of ecology. So if you don't know
what those words mean, hang tight. We're moving straight to
the recitation. So we say we're talking about colonialism through
the lens of ecology.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Colonialism is a human process that has to do with
unequal power structures one society interfering with another society's ability
to thrive. There are a bunch of different types of colonialism,
but what we're going to focus on in this episode
is called Setler colonialism. Sellar colonialism implies a group of
people moving into another group of people's territory and claiming
(03:39):
it as their own, and in order to do that,
they are willing to eliminate that other group of people physically, culturally,
and everything else.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And the lens through which we're going to explore colonialism
is ecology. If you remember from our Cuffing season episode,
Ecology is a branch of biology that deals with the
relationship of one organism to another, and those organisms to
their physical surroundings.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
I think it's important for us to kind of unpack
some of this stuff and talk about some of the
broader ramifications of colonialism. Like we're becoming more and more
aware of the effects that it had on the Native
American population, But there are other things that were affected too.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Right. We know there are lots of plants and animals
that are extinct that exist no more.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Right there are fruits and veggies that are not indigenous
to North America that are here, that are here that
we eat daily, that are in our supermarkets, that are
now grown in the United States. But I have a
lot of questions about all of this because I feel
like I only like see like a little little corner
of it. It's like, not even like the tip of
(04:50):
the iceberg. I don't even feel like I see the
full tip of the iceberg. I feel like I can
only see like a snowflake. And so I really just
want an avalanche of information about all of this, the
effects on flora and fauna, the effects on the indigenous
people of North America, the effects on animals and everything.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
That's an ambitious I know it's good, right because I
think what it says is that you understand that there
are effects, right. There are often people think like, oh,
it's just you know these groups and then you know,
my cousin is part Cherokee, and it's like, no, no, no,
you don't understand all of these groups that were basically eradicated.
You know. So we've got these big questions, but what
(05:35):
do we really want to get to the bottom of?
What are we pressing out here?
Speaker 1 (05:38):
One of the things is what was the ecology of
North America before European colonialism? Yeah, and how did the
indigenous communities interact with their environment before then?
Speaker 2 (05:50):
Yeah, there's probably a lot we can learn. And then
I guess the next question that follows that is how
was ecology affected after colonialism started? So now these people
are here. Is it a rapid decline? Is it gradual?
Like what's happening?
Speaker 1 (06:06):
And I think the last question that I have is
what do we do going forward with all the information
that we're about to get. What are the steps that
we can take as citizens of America, citizens of this world,
citizen scientists, as global citizens, as I like to say,
to make things better and to improve the environment.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Yeah, because I think we're definitely at a point now
where we're back in the stage of conservation, trying to
undo all of this stuff that's been done in the
past couple hundred years.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
And you can't know where you're going unless you know
where you came from. A so let's get into the
dissection and to help us out, we called on doctor
Nicholas Rio.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
I'm a citizen of the sus Saint Mary tribe of
Chipwall Indians, which is a tribal nation located in Northern
Michigan what's now known as Northern Michigan. And I'm an
associate professor of Native American Studies and Environmental Studies at
Dartmouth College.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Doctor Rial Studies Indigenous Knowledge and Ecological Stewardship on Indigenous lands.
Another area of his focused is broadening discussions on climate
change and invasive species by including indigenous lives and indigenous perspectives.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
What is invasive species.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Invasive species are organisms that are non native to an area,
and so often because they're not native, they're able to
take over an area and eliminate other native plants. Or
if a native plant is wiped out and an invasive species,
a non native plant is brought in, then they kind
of like claim that area.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Settlar colonialism on a plant scale and animal scale.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Doctor Rio is the perfect guest for this episode because
when we talk about European colonialism, it's always through the
lens of the Europeans, yep, Like they were these great
people that they were going out and building these ships
and sailing across all the seven seas and doing this
really great work. But there were other people on these
(08:03):
lands that were already there, living and thriving before they
got there.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
And in this episode, we really want to talk about
the land in the context of the indigenous experience, knowledge,
and rich history.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
So let's start by talking about the northeast region of
what is now known as the United States way before
European colonialism.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So the Northeast is a huge region. Prior to European contact,
you had a lot of people. It was, first of all,
very much a peopled landscape. We tend to underestimate not
only the presence of indigenous people, but the influence of
indigenous people on the landscape.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So not only was the land highly populated by diverse
indigenous communities, it was also very developed, but not in
a way that was familiar to Europeans.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
When Europeans first laid eyes on, you know, the various
parts of the Northeast, they misinterpreted those spaces as being
you know, natural quote unquote, as being wilderness and defining
that as a place that is sort of, you know,
kind of it's got the natural ecology going on and
that doesn't involve human interference or inputs.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Just because they didn't recognize a neat, little English garden
didn't mean that the land hadn't been cultivated for a
long period of time. Indigenous tribes in the Northeast were
producing food and medicine within the landscape through really dynamic,
committed relationships with different plants, animals, and ecosystems.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
I feel like there's a lot we can learn from
what the relationship is between self and environment right from
some of these indigenous groups, because you have to think
if they were making medicine and doing all this stuff,
but when you show up with your European eyes, you
felt like the land was uninhabited.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
Right.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
That speaks volumes in my mind right about not disturbing nature,
and there have to be some clues learn they're about
conservation and to help us understand this relationship, Doctor Rio
told us about the important connection between a Nishionabe people,
one of the indigenous groups in the Great Lakes region
of North America, and their important relationship to wild rice
(10:14):
or what is called in the national language mynomen.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
It's a very culturally significant plant and being to Annihanabe people.
It's really a core part of our cultural identity. It's
a core part of how we understand where we fit
in the world. And it has an incredible nutritional value too,
and so it's an important part of our food ways.
We don't just treat it like it we're a relative.
It's like literally a part of our ken.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
It's just like the respect that you have for your
friends or your family, Like respecting them doesn't mean, you know,
not checking in on them, not giving them the resources
they need to survive, not talking to them and making
sure that they're okay, Like they approach it the exact
same way, like it's their family, and the Innitianabe approach
(10:58):
to the care and harvesting of this world rice is
with the same kind of respect.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
The specific ways that we knock rice into our boats.
It allows for the plants to produce more seed and
for a lot more of that seed to actually germinate
at the bottom of the lake bed than if you
were to not touch it at all.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
I mean, I think that's really interesting because when we
think about respect, sometimes you think that means like leave
it alone, don't touch it. But in this case, they're saying,
we are doing specific actions to stimulate growth, right, to
encourage seeds to drop down into this fertile soil and
to grow more plants.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
I think that there's a lot of examples like that
where it's definitely a sort of an indigenous perspective about
reciprocal relationships between humans and plants and humans and animals.
Indigenous perspectives more often hold that our dynamic engagement with
those plants and animals helps them to thrive in various ways.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
So that's a great point. What about the animals? For
the Initionabe, there is also great importance on interaction between
humans and animals. There's a relationship there that requires attension
and care. Doctor Rio gave us a great example.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
So for Nishinabe folks, some of our oldest teachings about
our connections to other beings on this planet tell us
that we are on a parallel path with wolves, who
we refer to as Mayingen, and that whatever happens to Mayingen,
what happened to the Nishanabk. Both Mayingen and a Nishanabek
(12:28):
rely heavily on wawashkashe or the deer as a really
important part of our food ways. If the deer population
is suffering, then we'll see Mayingen and a Nishnabek both
populations suffering. And so we're integrally tied together and our
fates are interwoven, and recognizing that connection makes a Nishanabic
(12:49):
folks very committed to the well being of both wolves
and deer.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
I think that's a great illustration or example of like
how we're all tied together. People say it, but like
this is that in practice.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
Absolutely, Like there's no distinction between us and the trees
and the leaves and the grass and the seeds. We're
all a part of this world ecosystem.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, so we've learned that for centuries before European colonialism started,
North America was a densely populated and diverse region where
indigenous peoples thrived by cultivating sophisticated intimate relationships with plants, animals,
and the rest of the ecosystem around them. But what
happened when the Europeans got there? How are those balances affected.
We'll get into those questions right after the break.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
We're back. And as doctor Rio explained, before European colonialism,
indigenous communities in North America had for centuries been thriving
off the land through their highly evolved and complex cultural practices,
specifically their relationship with the environment around them.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
What we know is that these practices were severely disrupted
when the Europeans arrived. So basically, when Europeans arrived, they're like,
I don't recognize any of this. This needs to be tamed,
this needs to be put into, you know, my category
of gardening, or like, I don't.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Know these animals, where are the animals that we're used to.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
For them, everything was discovery that was waiting to be influenced.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
The major effect of European colonialism is the genocide of
indigenous people period. But there are other things that were
also affected that doctor Rio helped us dive into more.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
He told us about major changes in four main areas, diseases,
invasive species, deforestation, and global biotic exchange.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Some of the sort of categorical changes that we have
seen come from the introduct of diseases.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
My friend was not lying when she said the Pilgrims,
that's right.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Tuberculosis, smallpox, the flu. These were all brought from Europe
and contributed to the depopulation of North America.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
These diseases that were brought from Europe to North America,
they were very influential in the severe reduction in the
human population of the continent prior to the big waves
of colonization. You know, the changeover from primarily, you know,
from an indigenous human population to relatively short order a
predominantly euro American settler, euro Canadian settler population. You know,
(15:41):
a great deal that had to do with the introduction
of diseases.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
This is interesting, he said, You know, the severe reduction
of human population of the continent prior to the big
waves of colonization. So this is not just violence with
a sword, right, Like, this is biological warfare for real.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
The next area that was greatly affected was invasive species.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
The introduction of European agricultural systems came with a lot
of associated pest species. So Europeans brought some species on
purpose that had deletorious impacts on the North American landscape,
and then they brought in some as hitchhikers.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
And it's so interesting because you know, the question is
was it intentional? Was it unintentional? But we know, you
know the Spanish, right, they really pride themselves on being explorers.
And I think I was reading somewhere that the Spanish
crown used to require all of their exploratory ships right
to carry seas and plants and livestocks when they went
(16:38):
on expeditions. Right, this is so they could establish European
forms of agricultural production. Can you imagine, You're like, I'm
going somewhere, I don't know anything about it, but I'm
taking my cow, taking my pig, a couple of these seeds,
and it's like, you don't know what those effects are.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Right. It's just like if so we live on the
East Coast to move to Arizona, which is a lot
of desert and things like that, and we say, well,
I don't want to live in the desert. I want
to live and what I'm used to. I want to
have a lawn I want to have I don't want
to have you know, these types of trees. I don't
want palm trees. I want like a regular maple tree.
And we go there and we dig up the earth
(17:16):
and we put down soil that is that a maple
tree can live in, and we change the ecosystem around
us to fit what we want that is existing on
the East Coast, and that begins to buy default change
everything around it.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's like the Butterfly fect. Yeah you know that movie, Yes,
with Ashton Kutcher. Yes, it's like the Butterfly Fact, except
you don't get to go back and do it over exactly.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
And preserving these natural parts of different environments is super
important to the overall health of the ecosystem.
Speaker 3 (17:52):
And it's not only plants but also animals. And then
one of the more notable one is hogs. So bringing
in pigs and letting them sort of run free. They
naturalized and had major impacts on forests of New England
and other other regions.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
That's wild to me.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
There were no hogs here.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
That's the major industry in North Carolina.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
When we think about America and how Americans eat, pork
is a major part of that. And I've never considered
that they weren't indigenous to North America. But they've not
only contributed to our diet, they ate up a lot
of the forests.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, you know, I see this in the movies all
the time, and they say like how pigs and hogs
can totally like rip up roots and everything with their
snouts and clear whole fields of like trees and grasses
and native grasses. But also I see people use pigs.
They say they will eat anything, like they will eat humans.
They will eat Did you know that now, Yes?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
So that leads us into the next topic that was
really affected by colonialism, deforestation.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
So European settlers cut down forests in ways that had
never really been It's not that it's not that indigenous
peoples didn't cut trees, certainly they did, but the scale
of timber harvest is that a completely different level by
European settlers.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
One thing that the Europeans were doing was cutting down
a lot of trees, yes, in order to have like.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
Rolling hills like they had in Europe.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Exactly to more so mimic what they had in Europe,
and then also to like build stuff. And when they're
shipping things to other countries, they want to put it
into a box, and the cut down a tree to
build a box for that and things like that. But
another thing that came along with that is that they
also were bringing over trees, yes, that are native to Europe, right,
(19:43):
because they wanted to again mimic the European landscape. And
these trees when they would bring them over, they would
bring them over the whole tree and roots and everything everything.
And so when you're bringing the roots along, you have
to bring the dirt and soil that it was in. Yeah.
And when they did that unintentionally or intentionally, we're not
really sure, but they also brought over earthworms. The earthworm
(20:07):
is not something that is native to the United States,
and so they would come over with the tree, they
would plant it in the ground, and these earthworms they
spread like wildfire. We see earthworms from sea to shining sea, Okay,
like they are everywhere and what we don't know because
when we think about earthworms, we're like, oh, they're so
good for our ecosystem and things like that. But earthworms
(20:29):
also have contributed a lot to deforestation. I'm looking at
this picture from a paper that somebody wrote that shows
two pictures, a picture of a forest with no earthworms, right,
and a forest that has earthworms, And there is a
clear difference. There's still trees. It looks like a forest
that we would walk through. It has trees, it has
(20:50):
little bushes, it has you know, logs and everything like that,
but the forest is impacted by earthworm. Conception of leaf
detritus leave to try is the kid. You can explain
it way better than me.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, it's just like falling leaf waste or debris. But
that also is like fertilizer, right. That is then those
nutrients from those deadlys are then reconsumed by that soil.
They add bat you fall from the tree cover down
to the ground, you provide nutrients for that soil.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
So the earthworms are eating all that stuff up, which
completely changes the look and feel of the forest.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
And the last of these categories is global biotic exchange.
So this is the movement of products, food, agricultural products
across the globe.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Basically, especially as we as we see the movement of
not just people but sort of products and goods. When
we see global trade pickup, and there's the movement of
products food, agricultural products, but also things that are made
of wood or that require the packaging of wood and
pallets and things like that. But just the movement of
(21:56):
goods across continents through shipping, sort of the globalization of
our economic system, then we see a huge increase in
biological introductions across continents, and that's a big impact.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
I think an important point to make is that all
of these categories that we're talking about do not exist
in isolation. When you affect one, you affect all of them.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Right, And that's what makes the impact so large. Right.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
So, even something like deforestation and disease. So let's say
that they bring over hogs that eat up all the
plants and the trees and everything like that. But there's
a specific plant that they used for medicine, and if
that plant is no longer there and this disease shows up,
that they would normally use a plant as this plant
as a treatment and the planet isn't there, then you
(22:41):
would have depopulation, yep.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And then what is the effect of the depopulation, right,
Because when we think about these intentional relationships with plants
and animals, if you're wiping out these indigenous communities, who
is the steward of this land now?
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Right? Who's cultivating and who's building? Those are relationships with plants, animals, trees,
and everything in between.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Yeah, we have to think about the impacts of genocide.
The depopulation of the Americas, the severe reduction of indigenous
populations had a huge impact on the things that we're
talking about and the context of you know, if what
we saw. You know, you asked, what would the northeast
have looked like prior to European contact? And I said, well,
(23:26):
a lot of what you saw had to do with
relationships between plants and animals and humans. When you take
a lot of the humans out of that picture, it
affects what's going on ecologically more broadly.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
The other really interesting thing is that this is not
just a historical issue, like this is something that persists.
It's still happening today in so many ways.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, on reservations where indigenous communities experience disproportionately high rates
of unemployment, health issues, and suicide.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
And so when we talk about when people, especially indigenous
studies scholars, talk about settler colonialism, we don't talk about
it as something that happened. We talk about something that's ongoing.
So as long as there's a settler presence, and as
long as Indigenous lives are being eliminated, as long as
Indigenous cultures are being ignored or eliminated, then settler colonialism
(24:18):
is ongoing. It's a set of structures and not a
moment in time.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
So, like you were saying, these things are persistent. It's
not something that's just in the past and we just
look back on it and say, oh man, that sucks.
We're still currently dealing with all of these things. So
my question is what can we do going forward to
make our environment better, not just for our plants and animals,
(24:47):
but for the indigenous population as a whole.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
I think we have to figure out ways to make
space for indigenous peoples. We need to be able to
make space physically. You know, people need physical space for
their for their political and cultural and economic endeavors. So
that has to do with returning land so we need
to make that kind of space. Make space politically so
that the places that indigenous peoples do have some control,
(25:12):
you know, reservations, other places, urban centers where indigenous peoples
are living and have some control, to create policy structures
that allow them to have self determination for their own futures,
to determine their own future paths, and to not interfere
with a lot of court rulings and policies that interfere
with their ways of interacting with the world. And to
make space ontologically to recognize the importance of indigenous ways
(25:36):
of understanding the world and ways of being in the world,
to make space for that in our education system and
the court of law and other places.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
As people who want to be aware of, you know,
all the ways that we are affecting our environment and
the ecology. I think this kind of just shine a
light in a very dark corner, Yes.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And I think there's a lot to be learned here,
right even in your outlook and approach. Sometimes these things
can feel so overwhelming and you feel like, oh, well,
there's nothing I can do. But I think even some awareness,
some space and just thinking about taking this interconnected approach
to everything that you do to conservation, to changes you
(26:33):
want to make right. It all matters.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Yeah, I mean, do a little bit of research on
where you're from, your town, your state, and find out
about the indigenous people of that area and take that
first initial step. And once you can find out what
they were doing and the way that the landscape looked,
then you can make deliberate efforts to improve our environment.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
There are a lot of organizations that are pushing back
to replanting some of our native seeds and plants, and
so there's a lot of opportunity you just have to
go looking for.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
What I think I might do is do some research
on the indigenous people of Maryland and my county, PG
County and find out the types of food that they
were eating and maybe try and make something with those ingredients.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
I hope they're still around for you to do it exactly.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
It might be tough, but I think it's worth it.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Yeah, I'm in. I'm in.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
That's it for Lab eighteen. Don't forget to check out
our website for a cheat sheet on today's episode. You
can find it and sign up for our newsletter at
Dope labspodcast dot com.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
Also, we love hearing from you what did you think
about today's lab? What are your ideas for future labs?
Give us a call. Our number is two zero two
five six seven seven zero two eight. You can also
find us on Twitter and Instagram at Dope Labs. Podcasts,
tt is on Twitter at dr Underscore t.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
SA, and you can find Zakiya at z Said So.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Follow us on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Special thanks to our guest doctor Nicholas Rio. You can
find out more about his work in our show notes.
Our producer is Jenny rattlet Mass of Wave Runner Studios.
Mixing and sound design by Hannis Brown and special thanks
to Tyler Adams.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
Original theme music is by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex sugi Ura,
with additional music by Elijah Alex Harvey.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Dope Labs is a production of Spotify Studios and Mega
Own Media Group, and it's executive produced by us T. T.
Shadia and Zakiah Wattley.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
Kats are not native to the United States.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Yes, the bird people have been really telling me a
lot about that, because they're saying that well, the bird
people I follow on Twitter. Shout out to the Autobon
Society
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Are You A Charlotte?
In 1997, actress Kristin Davis’ life was forever changed when she took on the role of Charlotte York in Sex and the City. As we watched Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte navigate relationships in NYC, the show helped push once unacceptable conversation topics out of the shadows and altered the narrative around women and sex. We all saw ourselves in them as they searched for fulfillment in life, sex and friendships. Now, Kristin Davis wants to connect with you, the fans, and share untold stories and all the behind the scenes. Together, with Kristin and special guests, what will begin with Sex and the City will evolve into talks about themes that are still so relevant today. "Are you a Charlotte?" is much more than just rewatching this beloved show, it brings the past and the present together as we talk with heart, humor and of course some optimism.