Interview with Michelle Hamman of MotherTongues

by: Dennis Salazar

22 Jun 2010

Use promo code GLOBE for a 15% discount on your purchase at www.MotherTongues.com – valid till 8/30/2010.

Interview with Michelle Hamman of MotherTongues

The green community is blessed with many kind hearted and dedicated people eager and willing to make a difference. Every once in a while we are fortunate enough to meet a person and organization that really stands out in that crowd. One of them is Michelle Hamman and her company MotherTongues.

DS: Michelle, before we start talking about your business, please tell our readers about your background and home life including the transition from professional, to stay at home mom and entrepreneur.

MH: Dennis, thank you for letting me tell the MotherTongues story. I made the transition from electrical engineer to home based entrepreneur when our daughters were 1 and 3, and it was getting too difficult to keep up with changing diapers, coordinating naptime and working from home. As a bilingual person, language is important to me and so too the differences that are embedded in culture. MotherTongues began when my husband and I explored the riches different languages and cultures offer. The company has just grown from there.

DS: Your company is very unique in a market crowded with “message apparel” companies. Please explain to our readers how yours is so very different.

MH: I research words that have no direct English translation and print them with poetic and symbolic descriptions on t-shirts, socks, aprons, scarves, and tote bags. The values of community, peace, justice, and ecological well-being contained in the words are definitely unique! People wearing MotherTongues apparel show their “philosophy of life.” One’s worldview is not related to one’s age and MotherTongues clothing is worn by 4-year-olds to 80-year-olds!

MotherTongues is a fair labor, organic cotton apparel company. This combination is uncommon, but important to me since MotherTongues nurtures the earth as well as its peoples.

DS: That of course leads us to the story and meaning of your very first, and to date most popular tee shirt – Ubuntu

MH: Ubuntu is a very unique Zulu or Xhosa word from my “mother country”, South Africa. Ubuntu is a term for humaneness, for caring, sharing and being in harmony with all of creation. In “No Future Without Forgiveness” Archbishop Desmond Tutu says this about the concept of ubuntu: “Africans have a thing called ubuntu. It is about the essence of being human, it is part of the gift that Africa will give the world. It embraces hospitality, caring about others, being willing to go the extra mile for the sake of another. We believe that a person is a person through other persons, that my humanity is caught up, bound up, inextricably, with yours. When I dehumanize you, I inexorably dehumanize myself. The solitary human being is a contradiction in terms. Therefore you seek to work for the common good because your humanity comes into its own in community, in belonging.”

Hospitality, humanity, community, belonging…. Aren’t these meaningful and beautiful values that we can all relate to and learn from?

DS: How do you decide on the words and messages you select for your product line?

MH: I research interesting words and concepts in diverse cultures and numerous languages through personal travel and MUCH reading. Immigrant friends and persons hearing about MotherTongues too are sources of new words.

DS: I know you are very generous in terms of sharing your sales proceeds. Please tell us about some of the organizations you support.

MH: MotherTongues supports the Center for Women in Transition, a center in my hometown serving women and children who are victims of interpersonal violence and other life-changing situations. CWIT receives $1 of every t-shirt, tote bag or apron sold. For every Sisu t-shirt or bag sold, MotherTongues donates $1 to the American Cancer Society. My intention is to support more causes that align with the MotherTongues ethos in our community and wider as MotherTongues sales grow.

DS: Tell us a bit about the MotherTongues green journey.

MH: MotherTongues has been transformational in my own life. My ecological awareness has grown even as my concern for many societies around the world increased. I’m taking it a step at a time: 4 years ago I changed to organic cotton, fair labor t-shirts, then I switched to using 100% post consumer waste paper for the hang tags and brochures. All inventory is in the process of switching to water based screen printing, which is more eco-friendly overall than plastisol printing. I recently switched to recycled paper shipping envelopes (thanks, Dennis!), and I buy carbon offsets for the shipping and home office electricity use. It continues to be a journey!

DS: As we have been doing this interview via the internet, I know you’ve been in Mexico with your family. Can you tell us a little bit about your time there?

MH: My husband has an academic sabbatical. First we are first spending 3 months in Chiapas, Mexico to learn Spanish. Wow, it is not easy to learn a new language as an adult! But our kids, now 6 and 8, are soaking it up. Then we’ll be in Lusaka, Zambia where my husband will teach and the kids will attend an International School, and lastly we’ll visit our family in South Africa. Fortunately, I can manage MotherTongues from anywhere: Melissa is shipping all orders from Holland (Michigan), and all the new sights, sounds, and tastes are fueling my creative ideas.

DS: I encourage everyone to visit the MotherTongues site and learn more about this very unusual and terrific company. Also, Michelle has been kind enough to offer our readers a 15% discount on our purchase if we use promo code GLOBE. This offer is valid to 8/30/2010.

Thank you Michelle. We appreciate you taking time from your work and travel to share your amazing story with us.