00;00;04;15 - 00;00;40;18
Erica Machulak
Welcome to the Hikma Collective podcast. I'm your host, Erica Machulak: writer, medievalist and founder of Hikma. We're calling this season The Art of Alternatives because we're looking at how people bring their values and skills across contexts in really interesting ways that are inspiring both personally and intellectually. In this episode, we're talking with Dr. Crystal Marie Moten. Crystal is a historian who specializes in 20th century United States and women's gender history with a specialization in African-American women's history.
00;00;41;14 - 00;01;03;17
Erica Machulak
Her research examines black women's struggles for economic justice in the 20th century urban north. She currently works as curator of African-American history in the Division of Work and Industry at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. She's also public historian in residence at American University. And both of those roles are in Washington, D.C.
00;01;05;19 - 00;01;38;21
Erica Machulak
Crystal and I have had many very generative coffee conversations about social enterprise and the ways that people across contexts to do good work and what that means in both the way that you find purpose and the way that you thrive in your personal life. And she's really been an inspiration well before and throughout the development of Hikma, so I'm really pleased to be able to share this conversation between Crystal and our course participants with you.
00;01;38;29 - 00;01;41;15
Erica Machulak
Hope you enjoy.
00;01;45;18 - 00;01;55;01
Erica Machulak
Well, thank you, everyone. All right. Crystal, would you please tell us sort of what you're doing now and how you got to where you are?
00;01;55;16 - 00;02;23;00
Crystal Moten
Yeah, awesome. I would love to. So right now, professionally, I am working as a curator of African-American history at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.. And so curator there I've been at the museum. I just made my two year anniversary last week. I've spent more time working from home than in the actual museum because of our current global health crises.
00;02;23;29 - 00;02;55;18
Crystal Moten
But I got to the museum after really having a reckoning about how I wanted to be a historian and how I wanted to use the skills that I had both learned in graduate school and post graduate school. And so I ended up coming to the museum. I was a professor, assistant professor of history for six years. I've worked at two institutions, both small liberal arts colleges, one on the East Coast, one in the Upper Midwest.
00;02;55;26 - 00;03;20;29
Crystal Moten
And what I realized about working, doing history in those environments was that the audience that I wanted to reach was different from the audience I wanted to reach. And the audience I wanted to reach was a kind of a small, privileged group of folks, diverse in some ways and undiverse in other ways.
00;03;21;16 - 00;03;53;25
Crystal Moten
But I wanted more people to have access to the stories that I know and love, that I studied, that I experienced personally, and that I thought that other people knowing would help to transform our world and bring us closer to liberation and justice, specifically for African-Americans or black folks. And so at the museum, some positions came up for scholars who had research, writing and communication skills in African-American history.
00;03;54;02 - 00;04;22;22
Crystal Moten
And although I had never worked at a museum, I love museums, but I didn't particularly have any specific museum training. I just threw my hat in the bag. And I really learned about the job, as I went through the interview process and through that interview process, I figured out that, Oh, this is something I can use my skills toward, as well as put the topic that I love more on a national platform.
00;04;22;27 - 00;04;51;23
Crystal Moten
And so that's what brought me to the the American History Museum. Now, because I came from the professoriate, I still had a number of projects I was working on, including writing a book, which I'm in the process of almost finishing, as well as really still being interested in an education that is my calling, I believe, even though my professional work revolves around history.
00;04;51;29 - 00;05;18;00
Crystal Moten
I do believe my calling in life is to be an educator. And so that's in my heart. And so I'm always looking for ways to to teach. And so at the museum, you can do public programs. You can talk to small audiences. But, there really is not the you can adjunct, which I also do, but there really is not a dedicated pathway, a toward education as a curator.
00;05;18;24 - 00;05;45;26
Crystal Moten
And so this led me to think about, okay, the intersection of education, of digital studies and black history. And that's what led me to start the podcast, which you all have many of you have listen to the pilot episode. And so that kind of feeds my love of education, my love of sharing stories, and my love of introducing black history to a very broad audiences.
00;05;45;26 - 00;05;49;23
Crystal Moten
So that's a little bit about where I am right now and how I got to be where I am.
00;05;50;24 - 00;06;06;10
Erica Machulak
Things I love how you've talked about being educators, of calling and also education, taking all these different forms. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what it means to be a scholar and how much you see yourself as a scholar and all these different facets of your life.
00;06;07;01 - 00;06;34;20
Crystal Moten
Yeah, you know, that's a very interesting question because there are some who would say that because I you know, I left the professoriate. I'm no longer in the academy, that I'm either not a scholar or I'm not an academic. Right? And I see myself as both, because for me, a scholar forces knowledge, a scholar pursues is in pursuit of answering various types of questions.
00;06;35;03 - 00;07;00;04
Crystal Moten
And what I think now is that I have more tools in my toolkit to answer questions about the topics that matter most to me. And so I see myself as a scholar because I'm interested in the pursuit and the dissemination of knowledge. Right. And that can happen. I mean, that can happen anywhere, actually. You know, I think of scholar broadly, broadly defined as well as knowledge and as well as intellectualism.
00;07;00;04 - 00;07;16;26
Crystal Moten
And that's kind of part of what my research project is about as well. And so I definitely see myself as a scholar, but with more tools at my disposal because I am in, I'm able to cross many different kind of mediums as well as different types of industries now.
00;07;18;07 - 00;07;38;12
Erica Machulak
I love that. Thank you. I love that explanation. I've been thinking a lot about a term that's come up in our in our conversations, a lot with different people in this course about what it means to be an independent scholar. And I keep playing with this idea of the networked scholar. Right? None of us really operate totally on an island on our own.
00;07;38;12 - 00;07;51;28
Erica Machulak
And so one of the things that being an scholar outside of those traditional academic structures opens up for you is that you can do your scholarship in collaboration with all kinds of folks and however you want. I mean, this event being a case in point. Yeah.
00;07;51;29 - 00;08;15;09
Crystal Moten
Yes, I totally I totally agree. I mean, the thing about being a scholar for me and you might be able to make it to generalize, but I'm not really a theory person, so I hate generalizing and I'm a historian. So it's context, time and space, right? And so thinking about being a scholar, you always have to be embedded within a community, right?
00;08;15;16 - 00;08;36;29
Crystal Moten
Because while many times, especially for the humanities, you know, we are mostly single authored, independent. Working on your own project. Right? And it can it can seem like, okay, you're just, you know, your your one little self off in your office doing your own independent project. But actually, in order for you to get your project done, you need to be a community.
00;08;36;29 - 00;09;05;00
Crystal Moten
And that community can be you know, you're creating that community with your research, with the revision process, disseminating your research. And so for thinking about independent scholar, I have to think about independent of what? Because you're not independent of a community of support. You're not independent of a community of research. You're not independent of a community of care.
00;09;05;01 - 00;09;32;03
Crystal Moten
So what are you what are you no longer depending on? Perhaps the academy? Right. And so you have to I qualify that independent because I don't think I can do the scholarship alone. I mean, there's no way there's no way that I can do. I can pursue my scholarly agendas, from my home office by myself.
00;09;33;03 - 00;09;39;25
Erica Machulak
And so can you tell us a little bit more about what the community in which you do your scholarship looks like? How does that work for you?
00;09;40;11 - 00;10;12;29
Crystal Moten
Yeah, I find that I thrive with multiple types of communities. And sometimes these communities or networks, as you just refer to them as they can overlap, you know, they can or they can be distinct. And so, for example, I for my work at the museum in terms of being a curator, which really focuses on acquiring objects for the museum in the national collection, creating exhibits, doing programs around the research.
00;10;13;00 - 00;10;34;08
Crystal Moten
Right that I'm involved in. Each of those museum specific tasks requires a different community of folks. And of course, sometimes they overlap. Sometimes they don't. They don't. Let's say take one task by acquiring an object. You know, for me to be able to acquire an object, I have to have relationship with people.
00;10;34;14 - 00;10;54;12
Crystal Moten
To understand, okay, what's my topic? My specific topic is black business and labor history, right? What am I trying to learn about black business and labor history? Me I'm trying to learn about the working conditions of black women over the course of the 20th century. All right. Where am I trying to go to get this information? Who do I know in these places?
00;10;54;17 - 00;11;22;28
Crystal Moten
What organizations might have the answers? What people might have the answers to? The questions that I have and thinking about kind of acquiring objects, you just don't swoop in, swoop down, get the object, fly back out. You are constantly in conversation, in collaboration, developing relationships with folks from whom you want to, understand their story and then also acquire the object.
00;11;22;28 - 00;11;48;04
Crystal Moten
And so that's just one set of communities that can be overlapping that can have multiple kind of entry points that I engage in. And that's just for the museum side of my work. Now, when I think about kind of my book project, I think about other types of communities. But yeah, so, yeah, I'll stop there.
00;11;48;04 - 00;12;01;19
Erica Machulak
Thank you. That's awesome. Any questions from the group? I certainly have more, but I don't want to hog all the time. Kendra, go ahead.
00;12;03;09 - 00;12;37;09
Kendra
Crystal I was interested in what you were saying in your podcast about coming at things from inside the circle. That's very much how I do things as well, both in terms of my fiction and my creative business. I was wondering, as someone who kind of is in a lot of different circles, academic and museum and etc., what kind of pushback if any, you get from insisting on that personal angle when you tell your stories?
00;12;38;19 - 00;13;02;11
Crystal Moten
Yeah, I think one of the so being a historian, we are really pushed toward what is your evidentiary foundation? Right. What what kind of primary sources are you using to back up what you are saying? And then, have other historians already said what you've said or have explored various ranges of the topic that you've explored?
00;13;02;22 - 00;13;39;25
Crystal Moten
And so for me, it's butting up against sometimes when the the the experience that I am trying to talk about, which may be a personal experience, but it may come from my specific positionality as a black working class woman. That's not well represented. That experience is not well represented either in primary or secondary sources. And so in bringing myself into the analysis, I might not be able to point to the evidentiary requirements or requisites that the field value.
00;13;40;26 - 00;14;10;00
Crystal Moten
And so that's where the pushback comes, right? That my experience as a black working woman, which of course, is not just my experience. But based on the black working women I have encountered where I've grown up. That I have encountered as a result of the communities that I've been involved in, that kind of inform who I am as a person when it's not represented in the traditional archival and historiographical sources, then people say, well, that's not, that can't be part of the narrative.
00;14;10;12 - 00;14;45;15
Crystal Moten
Right. Or gets it gets read as, Oh, that's just your personal experience. And while, that's valid in some disciplines as in history, if there is not an archival record that is not valued, it's not counted as you know, as history. Right? Is not is not able to be analyzed. And I remember specifically when I was starting graduate school, one of the things that my advisor told me at the very beginning of the program is that, oh, well, if it doesn't exist, you can't write about it.
00;14;45;15 - 00;15;10;25
Crystal Moten
If it doesn't exist in historical record, which is fraught, which is created by fallible human beings with prejudice. Right, with, you know, racism, with with power dynamics that would exclude certain less position, less power position, people rights. If it's not in those spaces, then you can't write about it because you have to have that with it.
00;15;11;09 - 00;15;41;29
Crystal Moten
Right. And so there's this insistence on specific kinds of evidence which are weighted, some evidence matters more, some evidence count more than others. And of the specific evidence of my existence. Doesn't count as much. And that is what I have to fight for when I'm writing black women's histories, right? When I am trying to write through the fragments of black women's histories, when I'm saying, wait a minute.
00;15;42;06 - 00;16;06;11
Crystal Moten
Okay. I grew up in Chicago. You know, in Chicago, there's this rich tradition of Black Club women, of black women's activism. I see it in my family. I see it in the church women who I see every Wednesday through Sunday. Right. As they're bolstering this church and contribute to their communities. But then I get to a seminar.
00;16;06;21 - 00;16;30;23
Crystal Moten
Right. And we read a book. And none of these women appear. And I know I'm not going crazy because I'm like, I just saw them. I just encountered them. I touch them. They are real people. But because the evidence, the fragments of their lives have not been collected in value, they don't count for the narrative. Right?
00;16;30;27 - 00;16;56;11
Crystal Moten
And so that's what I have to to work both with and against and when I think about kind of this idea of being inside the circle, it's both having a connection to and a relationship with the subject and the topics under study. Not that I'm trying to say that every black working class woman's experience is the same and therefore I can speak mine and it just is the same.
00;16;56;20 - 00;17;25;26
Crystal Moten
But that I am connected right to these stories and to these histories and this that connectedness, which, number one, informs my understanding that there is a there there. And that also makes me approach the archive with even more kind of dedication and more kind of determination to get at these stories. Because I know it's there.
00;17;26;03 - 00;17;36;06
Crystal Moten
I know it's there. I mean, I know that I'm there too, right? And so that's that's a little bit of what's been on.
00;17;36;06 - 00;17;48;10
Kendra
When you say, you know, it's there, do you mean that it's there and you just need to find it? Or do you mean it's there? It's there in the absences that you see it in the well.
00;17;48;10 - 00;18;16;22
Crystal Moten
So here's the thing. Like, I know I may not find it in the archives right? Because what I also know is that many times black women, their actions, their ideas, their their activism, their own, they're over there doing it. But there is no there's no record of it. Right. And so, for example, two scholars come to mind who do really great work with kind of speculation.
00;18;16;28 - 00;18;40;04
Crystal Moten
Right. And and speculation for historians is a little bit meh, but for as a fiction writer, you speculate all the time, right? But historians we don't speculate. Right. But there is a scholar, Tiya Miles, and another scholar. She's not a historian, but she uses the historical methods, Saidiya Hartman. And they kind of speculate in this arena called critical fabulations.
00;18;40;09 - 00;19;04;04
Crystal Moten
And that's kind of the idea of critical fabulation, where it's like she's speculating but critically. And so what that means is that you're looking at all of the possibilities of the historical moment. So, for example, if we're in 1960s urban America, Chicago, we know that there are tons of people who have migrated from South to north.
00;19;04;07 - 00;19;32;21
Crystal Moten
We know they're experiencing urban underdevelopment. We know they're experiencing many in poverty. We know what the urban environment kind of looks like. Because we've done that research. We also know that there is a tradition of black women saying, hey, I'm displeased with what I'm experiencing. We know that because we have we do have some records of that.
00;19;33;05 - 00;20;13;11
Crystal Moten
We may not have the record of that in, say, Hyde Park, South Side, Chicago. That's a lie, because I know we do because that's a rich neighborhood. But anyway, just for the purposes of this kind of this talk. For this point? And so what Hartman and what Miles would do is they would critically gesture right at what might that look like, even though we have no we may only have a new one newspaper article that said Black Beauty Asians scheduled a dance that raised money to send somebody or to purchase a flat arm.
00;20;13;12 - 00;20;42;01
Crystal Moten
I mean, that's a modern tool. But right like that, that may be all we have, but from that Black Beauticians program to dance to raise money for a black beauticians tool, like there's so much we can do with that. Number one, black beauticians were organized. Number two, they cared about kind of their sister of beauticians. Number three, they also were philanthropic.
00;20;42;01 - 00;21;05;24
Crystal Moten
They're raising money to give to someone else in pursuit of some other dream or goal. They existed in this urban environment. And were and were doing something about their conditions. But none of that was in that that little thing or that little piece. And so it's kind of it's imagining, you know, from a standpoint of what do I know about this historical context or about this context?
00;21;06;00 - 00;21;29;20
Crystal Moten
And then supposing what could happen in your supposition? It can come from, again, the archival record. It could come from what's already been written. And for me, work could come from is my understanding in my positionalityy and my personal experiences. I understand black beauticians because I grew up going to the back, the black beauty shop my entire life.
00;21;30;00 - 00;21;54;09
Crystal Moten
Right. So I have something to critically fabulous about what that experience of organizing tradition may look like. Now, when I go to the State Archives and go to the Division of Cosmetology and look up the the records of the black beauty salons. It's not going to say that the black beauty salon, they were full of organizers and activists.
00;21;54;16 - 00;22;22;04
Crystal Moten
Right. What it's going to say is that this black beauty salon existed in Hyde Park from 1954 to 1962, and it failed to submit. It's you know, it's documents to be recognized by the state. That's what it goes. Right? But then you put that together with the little the little fragment of a newspaper article, and you have a story that you can kind of critically think about all of the possibilities.
00;22;22;05 - 00;22;52;03
Crystal Moten
Right. Based on lots of different ways to look at that with the sources that you do have. So, yeah, like speculation, which again, is not something that historians are comfortable doing, becomes a way to uncover and recover stories that we have just said. "Okay, well, we just got the evidence. We justm we they're not gonna be there." But that leaves me out.
00;22;52;14 - 00;22;54;23
Crystal Moten
That leaves me out, you know? So.
00;22;56;04 - 00;23;03;23
Erica Machulak
Yeah. Thank you, Crystal. So what's the connection between speculate and objectivity, do you think?
00;23;04;05 - 00;23;30;04
Crystal Moten
Right. I mean, so so first I'll say, I don't think any scholar or researcher is objective or can be objective, because even if you, you know, you are engaged in some type of pursuit of a knowledge or question, the fact that you are engaged in that is a function of your desire and your interest in your mind saying, Oh, this is what I want to do.
00;23;30;15 - 00;23;50;12
Crystal Moten
And so already the decision to do it makes you it puts you in a particular position where you chose to do that because of your desires. And so you just can't even be objective because you care about it, right? Because you chose to do it. So I don't think number one, I don't think anybody can be objective.
00;23;50;12 - 00;24;12;07
Crystal Moten
And I think what we can do is really be clear about what draws us to do what we do and why. And it could be as simple as I want to study bicycles, because when I was a kid, I had a bicycle. Okay, fine. But let folks know that's why you're doing that, right? So that's kind of the basis that that I begin from.
00;24;12;13 - 00;24;39;19
Crystal Moten
But then thinking about objectivity and speculation. Speculation is not just willy nilly saying, "oh, I just think that this could be the case". And that's why it's really important to think about speculation in conversation with critical fabulation, because that critical part is really important. And for me, using those in tandem is what makes it work so well.
00;24;39;19 - 00;25;06;06
Crystal Moten
Because I am not just speculate, I'm speculating out of out of a context that I have researched and studied. And so in order for me to come up with this with this speculation, I have to have immersed myself in tons of different documents in life and narrowed them down and said, "oh, okay, if I go down this road, write X, Y and Z, you know, that means I can't go down that road".
00;25;06;07 - 00;25;36;15
Crystal Moten
And so, a good example is again, Tiya miles, you just wrote this book called Ashley's Sack, which is basically a material cultural analysis of a sack that an enslaved woman gave to her daughter as the daughter was being sold from her. Right. And the sack was found in modern day in like a flea market. And the person who bought it for like $20 felt that it was something important.
00;25;36;15 - 00;25;56;20
Crystal Moten
And so she took it to a historical society and they kind of did some analysis and realized that, okay, this is really important. So Tiya Miles has written about the sack, right? And all she has is this the sack but what she's done in thinking about the sack and the names of the women who are engraved on the sack.
00;25;56;25 - 00;26;27;05
Crystal Moten
So, for example, there's a woman named Rose on the sack. All we know is that Rose is enslaved, that she had a daughter. And that the daughter was sold from her. Tiya Miles kind of figured out that maybe they're from Charleston. So what she does is she goes to the archives, looks up the plantation records, and looks for every Rose in Charleston in the plantations during a particular time.
00;26;27;24 - 00;26;59;12
Crystal Moten
And then once she has that list of Roses, she looks to see which Rose had a daughter by the name of the daughter on the saack. Then she narrows that down. And so, like, speculation is not like it's based on, like, really tough, hard research. And it requires going down so many dead ends, but also documenting those dead ends so that you can then say, okay, I went down that that didn't work.
00;26;59;12 - 00;27;26;01
Crystal Moten
Right? So that means I can't go down, you know. And so it's really based on kind of deep, deep, deep research. And I think many times people that people hear, objectivity or subjectivity or closeness to your topic and think, oh, you're sloppy. And I kind of talk about this a little bit. "You're sloppy or you're not really doing due diligence", but it's the exact opposite.
00;27;26;17 - 00;27;50;20
Crystal Moten
That because you're so close and now I'm speaking personally because I'm so close to the story, I want to make sure I have done all of my due diligence. So make sure I follow every thread right so that I can really come up with a speculation that makes sense. That could have actually happened, even though I know that I am not 100% sure.
00;27;51;03 - 00;27;51;16
Crystal Moten
Right.
00;27;52;20 - 00;28;02;14
Erica Machulak
Yeah, totally. Thanks, Crystal. So. So we have a question here. Can you talk more about what things you are doing to be a successful academic outside of academia?
00;28;03;10 - 00;28;40;12
Crystal Moten
Yeah, that's a that's a great question. Okay. So another kind of disclaimer or clarification, and it's something that I go back and forth on a lot. I don't see myself as fully outside. I see myself as I'm not teaching well, I am teaching a little bit. But I'm not a tenured track tenured professor.
00;28;40;12 - 00;29;08;01
Crystal Moten
But I still see myself as desiring and wanting to influence knowledge and knowledge making in tons of spaces, including the academy. Because as I think about particularly the book that I'm writing on black women's activism, I want that to both be accessible to broader publics while also contributing to conversations that are happening in colleges and universities.
00;29;08;22 - 00;29;44;10
Crystal Moten
And so I don't I don't totally see myself as outside of the academy, but I love the heart of the question in terms of how am I defining success for myself outside of a system that has very specific understandings of what success looks like? Right. So how am I doing it for myself? And so for me, it really is thinking about what types of activities and relationships and my engaging in that make black history more accessible to everyone.
00;29;44;15 - 00;30;08;11
Crystal Moten
It also means thinking about what kind of institutional and structural barriers do I need to lend my voice and expertize to you to break down these barriers that would inhibit people from getting access to these types of histories and stories. And so successful for me really hinges on who am I talking to, right?
00;30;08;12 - 00;30;45;11
Speaker 2
Who am I being exposed to? Who are being exposed to the types of stories that I'm trying to tell? And so for me, that comes with the stuff I'm doing in the museum, it comes with community organizations I may be interested in and involved with, and it comes with continuing to research and write and interact with communities across the country so that I can make sure that the stories that are in the American History Museum are representative of the diversity of the experiences spoken specifically in the United States.
00;30;45;11 - 00;31;18;11
Crystal Moten
So that's what you know, that's how geographic I'm focused. But also what I want to also say in terms of being successful and what I have really decided to prioritize is my own kind of personal life and personal desires for both kind of advancement as the person Crystal wants to be in terms of being, you know, a sister, a partner, a daughter, a cousin, an organizer.
00;31;18;15 - 00;31;46;20
Speaker 2
And what what would allow me to be successful, you know, not only professionally, but personally, too? Because if I'm not thinking about who I am personally, then I can't really be successful professionally. And so, especially within the last few years, I've really been trying to focus on, okay, how can I take care of myself, intellectually, mentally, physically, emotionally, right?
00;31;46;26 - 00;32;16;23
Crystal Moten
So that I can be the best professional that I can be. And so that question just really for me, it hits on not just me professionally, but who I am as a person and how all of this intersects. Because I think for so long, you know, when I was a professor, you know, I just thought success missed being that good teacher, you know, making sure I published my scholarship making sure I was contributing to the life of the institution.
00;32;16;23 - 00;32;34;10
Crystal Moten
I was involved in it. If I could do that, then I'm successful. But it just there's there's so much more to what success is. And I learned that I have to define it for myself. Otherwise I'll be chasing someone else's definition that I might not ever catch up to.
00;32;35;09 - 00;32;35;27
Erica Machulak
Thank you.
00;32;36;05 - 00;32;36;20
Crystal Moten
Yeah.
00;32;37;09 - 00;32;44;01
Erica Machulak
Yeah. So what surface? What questions is this servicing for everyone? Any. Jill.
00;32;45;18 - 00;33;10;07
Jill
So I guess my question, well kind of two big questions really might take us back to your opening comments about if I understood the trajectory. You were an assistant professor at Macalester when you saw the opening at Smithsonian NMAAH. So you said that you kind of just saw the role and went after it, right? And learned about the day to day during the hiring process.
00;33;11;17 - 00;33;43;05
Jill
So I'm just wondering if you could reflect for us, and so many of us are sort of on the cusp of transitioning fully or partially out of academia. What kind of steps you took to reframe your skills? Because there is a pretty distinct stratification, right, between the historian and academia and the curator. Or what kind of avenues you pursued or conversations you had to make yourself a viable candidate for that position when much of your work history was housed within academia?
00;33;43;08 - 00;34;11;08
Jill
And then the second big question is, I'm just wondering if you have any tips or strategies for the networked scholar or the independent scholar for maintaining access to resources? Because that's the one thing that we often involuntarily give up, right, when we lose an institutional affiliation. I myself have been adjuncting for the last few years just to retain like library access and that's becoming unsustainable for a number of reasons.
00;34;11;24 - 00;34;19;08
Jill
So if you have any thoughts about how to kind of keep your one self hooked into that element of university life, I'd appreciate your thoughts.
00;34;19;23 - 00;34;43;21
Crystal Moten
Yeah, great. So as to your first question, in terms of thinking about again, I think what's at the heart of it is being able to transfer or articulate how the skill set I had as a professor could map on to the role of curator. Right. And what was the process by which I did that transformation and what kinds of conversations I needed to have and to make that happen?
00;34;44;09 - 00;35;39;19
Crystal Moten
And so, you know, when I saw the position description for curator of African-American History, a few things stood out to me. One was that at the top of the list was that you had to have experience researching African-American history. The next part was that you had to have experience writing and communicating what you researched. The next part was that you had to have some exposure to thinking kind of broadly about audience, broadly about education, etc.At the very least, kind of bottom or I would say minute to bottom was like this requirement that you got to collect objects.
00;35;40;13 - 00;36;05;05
Crystal Moten
And so what I did was like, okay, well, I've got three of the four, I've got 3 of the 4. You know, I've been doing 3 of the 4 for a long time. And then it just so happened that when I was in graduate school, my advisor taught a gender studies class that was on themes and theme theory, which is basically about material culture and objects.
00;36;05;11 - 00;36;30;00
Crystal Moten
And so I was like, I also have some coursework, but what I had to do was kind of craft that in a way to say, okay, I have most of what you're looking for and I'm open to being taught the rest. And that was enough to give me a conversation with the hiring committee.
00;36;30;01 - 00;36;56;14
Crystal Moten
You know, once my application made it through the the black hole of the Smithsonian H.R. process, I was able to have a conversation, like an initial conversation with the hiring committee, where when we're in I was very honest, I said, well, you know, I'm you all know I'm a professor. You know that most of my experience is with the research and the communicating part of the job description.
00;36;56;18 - 00;37;43;21
Crystal Moten
I have never worked. I love museums, but I have never worked in a museum. And what I asked them was, how are you going to train me? And the answer to that question, let me know that they were open to a person with my skill set and they were like, you know, there are they are training opportunities that the museum can both provide and support you in pursuing to help you get the round out the skill set of a curator and what I would say, what kind of reflecting on this, it makes me think that especially as you were, as you are all in a position where you're transitioning from something you
00;37;43;21 - 00;38;19;02
Crystal Moten
know how to do, you have practice to something you may no. Really throw your hat in and and, and when you get the opportunity to talk to the folks in the position in letting them know that you can learn, you want to learn, right? And that because you already have a process for knowing how to research and find answers, you can do it.
00;38;19;02 - 00;38;49;24
Crystal Moten
So many stories. But a small story is that in graduate school, I did not I was not exposed to black feminist theory at all. But what do I call myself? A black feminist historian. I taught myself there. But if you could teach yourself an entire field and then you know how to apply it to your research area, there are many things you can learn how to do, but you have to you have to figure out if the position you are interested in, right?
00;38;49;29 - 00;39;12;18
Crystal Moten
If they are open and flexible in being partners in your learning and your teaching, your learning and your pursuit of a new skillset. And when I found out that the museum was because I had the majority of what they were looking for, they were willing to take the risks and understand that, okay, she learned to do that, she can learn how to do this.
00;39;12;22 - 00;39;38;28
Crystal Moten
You know, she may not know how to be a curator coming in. But we are willing to help her learn. And so that's kind of how I kind of approach that. And and each step of the interviewing process, I just ask tons of questions with the understanding that I am making a professional transition. No one was, that was not a surprise to anyone.
00;39;39;01 - 00;39;59;13
Crystal Moten
I am making a professional transition. How are you going to help me be successful? And just be open to those conversations and the answers to those questions Let me know that, okay, I can come into this position because I will feel supported and I will be able to learn in it.
00;40;00;10 - 00;40;03;08
JIll
Right. Thank you. I mean, that's a really encouraging and helpful answer.
00;40;03;17 - 00;40;26;13
Crystal Moten
Yeah. And then your second question, access to resources. And what I'll just echo the difficulty. That it is continuing to get those act get that access. And what I've just done is similar to what you've done, just try to align myself with the institutions that have the resources that I need.
00;40;26;13 - 00;40;54;24
Crystal Moten
And so although I'm at the Smithsonian, we don't have all the resources, which is why I also adjunct and I adjunct at a major research university so I can have more resources. But that that is a problem of a problem of, you know, the word just jumped out of my mind. But it's a serious difficulty for folks who are trying to be knowledge makers and knowledge creators outside of, the professoriate.
00;40;54;26 - 00;41;27;04
Crystal Moten
And so what I have found is, is that it's not uniform all around, but more and more repositories, more and more digital databases have particular levels of access for people who are not tied to institution that allow access, that kind of like more affordable rates, understanding that you are not a library, you don't have access to a library, so you may need to pay a little bit less to get access to some of these resources.
00;41;27;12 - 00;41;54;17
Crystal Moten
But then me being a person who's interested in the digital, I'm also interested in kind of open access and making sure that as I think about how what I am producing gets out there, that it gets out there free, right? And it really is going to take more, more people involved in knowledge making to do that. So that we can we can begin to remove some of these barriers.
00;41;54;25 - 00;42;09;24
Crystal Moten
But also, again, thinking about how to think about change on an institutional and structural level. And I think we're moving, we're creeping toward that but we're just not there yet. And so it does require some hacking.
00;42;09;24 - 00;42;22;05
Erica Machulak
I think here I have one more question, but I wanted to it looks like we have time for about one more. So so I wanted to give the option to everyone on the floor. Anyone have anything they want to ask? Tania.
00;42;23;23 - 00;43;01;02
Tania
Thank you, Crystal, for such a great conversation. You're really an inspiring person and I don't know if I have a question, it's just more maybe like a comment, but I can see from your podcast and also from this conversation how important imagination has been in your professional development. You talk about historical imagination and now I see that you use the same strategy to imagine yourself in a position that you maybe couldn't if you follow like a traditional path, being what we consider academia, whatever that means.
00;43;01;11 - 00;43;18;01
Tania
So I don't know, I'm just really curious about your experience embracing that imagination as a so important aspect in your in your development as a professional and scholar. And yeah, thank you.
00;43;18;01 - 00;43;27;01
Crystal Moten
Oh, Tania, I love I love that. And you are so perceptive for kind of calling that out in the sense. And I would..
00;43;30;03 - 00;43;54;12
Crystal Moten
Growing up, I was an avid kind of reader of of all types of literature. And so I would just constantly be in other worlds. And part of it was because, you know, sometimes my own world was very difficult, you know? And so I would read these books, you know, be in other worlds and just kind of also and being in those other worlds, see myself in other places.
00;43;55;12 - 00;44;18;28
Crystal Moten
I'm also the type of person where I have to visualize, you know, in my mind, whatever I'm doing, right. And so right now, the visual visualization that I have is that I'm on a book tour next year, you know, because if I don't imagine myself on it, I'm not going to get to it. And so that imagination for me is also tied to spiritual belief.
00;44;18;28 - 00;44;44;09
Crystal Moten
I'm a very spiritual person, and so it's imagination, it's belief. Because, you know, there are tremendous odds against people like us. Right. And so if I don't have the sense of I'm going to see myself doing the thing I want and then believe enough to do it and then also work my ass off, you know, it just won't happen.
00;44;44;16 - 00;45;08;05
Crystal Moten
But like this, this it becomes really important because like, as you mentioned, there's some things that, you know, even with my even my imagination is limited, right. But what imagination does is it sometimes it lifts you from your present circumstance to get you propelled toward where you might want to be. Right. And, you know, you have to be mindful, right?
00;45;08;05 - 00;45;27;15
Crystal Moten
You just can't totally live in your imagination. But sometimes living in your imagination can take you to places you never thought you wanted to be. And that's the truth about this job at the Smithsonian. I didn't go out looking for this job. One of my friends sent me the link to these jobs and I was like, What is a curator?
00;45;28;09 - 00;45;46;00
Crystal Moten
And then I began to read and research, right? And then I imagined myself doing black history before a national audience and what that could look like and what that can mean and all of that, you know. And so. Yeah, Tania. So imagination. Yes. And creativity and belief.
00;45;46;25 - 00;45;47;25
Tania
Yeah. Thank you.
00;45;48;09 - 00;45;55;02
Erica Machulak
Thanks, Crystal This was amazing. Really glad to have you. And I know you have so much going on, so we appreciate your time.
00;45;55;05 - 00;46;13;24
Crystal Moten
Love being here. So nice to see you all and meet you all and hear from you. And I just wish you all the best of luck in your future endeavors as you decide what direction you want to take your life in. May, you feel inspired and confident in who you are and what you bring to the table.
00;46;13;24 - 00;46;44;20
Erica Machulak
Thank you. That's that's wonderful. We hope you have enjoyed this episode of the Hikma Collective podcast. I'm your host, Eric Machulak, writer, medievalist and founder of Hikma. The production of this episode was led by our fearless creative director, Sophia van Hees in collaboration with Nicole Markland, Dasharah Green, Eufemia Baldassarre and Matthew Tomkinson. Matthew composed the original music you hear now in his capacity as the 2022 Hikma Artist in Residence.
00;46;45;19 - 00;47;09;18
Erica Machulak
This podcast has been made possible with generous support from Innovate B.C., Tech Nation and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. You can find show notes, links and transcripts at www.hikma.studio/podcast. Hikma is situated on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the ən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ speaking Musqueam people.
00;47;10;17 - 00;47;30;14
Erica Machulak
We are grateful to be here and to share this space with you. Our speakers, team members and listeners are based all over the world and wherever you're listening, we encourage you to learn more about whose lands you're on.
